Aborym’s new album is titled Dirty, and it’s about being dirty. While thoughts of Christina Aguilera’s song of the same name rattle in Dead Rhetoric’s head, the focus shifts over to how in fact, most things these days are dirty. Heck, it’s a term we throw around rather indiscriminately to discuss the various crust and d-beat bands that overflow our scene, as well as the black metal brigade that can’t fathom having good production values. But, the connection between how filth-infested our modern world currently is and the lyrical gauntlet set down by Aborym has been made. They’re simply pointing out what we choose to ignore.
As the band’s sixth full-length, Dirty is predominantly fucked-up. It tangles industrial black metal with avant-garde sounds, all of which are meant to evoke feelings of disgust. And given the album’s overhanging sentiment of disgust and ill-will it’s no wonder the tidal wave of futuristic movements on “Irreversible Crisis” and “Raped by Daddy” are instant winners. Oh, let us not forget the band’s head-turning cover of Iron Maiden’s “Hallowed Be Thy Name.” Now, there’s some outside-of-the-box thinking.
Founding member, bassist, keyboardist, and vocalist Malfeitor Fabban wad kind enough to field DR’s inquiries about the new album, what “dirty” means to him, and those fabled days when Mayhem vocalist Attila Csihar was fronting the band. Here’s what the ever-kind man had to say…
Dead Rhetoric: You’ve always been on the outer reaches of black metal, even going back to your early days. Therefore, would it feel odd for Aborym to just fit in and be part of the scene?
Fabban: We play our shit since 1992 and since then we have never gave a shit about market rules, and the “scene” of what journalists talk about. All of this paid us back after so many years and what we play today seems to be considered a genre itself.
Dead Rhetoric: I’ve read you tagged the band as “electro-industrial extreme metal.” Most bands despise being tagged, but, do you embrace it?
Fabban: I honestly do not believe in labels, I think the music we play does not need labels…speaks for itself. “Electro-industrial extreme metal” is not a descriptive summary and in this case it helps preventing journalists to add dozens of other nouns and adjectives in order to melt other people’s brains…ha-ha.
Dead Rhetoric: Furthermore, you’ve recently hit the 20-year mark as a band. Aside from the obvious highs what are some of the high points…and lows?
Fabban: I would never tell you which is (if there is any at all) the lowest point of the career of my band, my friend ha-ha … forget about it! Seriously, in all these years, we have earned the trust of many fans all over the world and this for me, is the greatest victory.
Dead Rhetoric: Going back, you received some really strong press for Fire Walk With Us. Did you think it had the potential to become that elusive “next level” album for you guys?
Fabban: After so many years consider Fire Walk With Us a great record, but I think Dirty is the best record of all by Aborym since 1992. An album that will represent in a short while or in the next few years a new starting point. I can feel it. This time we have gone beyond…at least five to six years ahead.
Dead Rhetoric: Safe to say, your music isn’t for the conventional-minded. Is there a particular of person that is supposed to “get” Aborym?
Fabban: I think Aborym and especially Aborym of Dirty have become something that manages to combine different tastes light years far away from each other. This album is sprawling, quite sprawling and pointing to a top level. It’s an album that with no doubt will be loved by all those who like industrial music, electronics, extreme metal…and that in all probability will be hated by purists or those who have a brain and an open mind the size of a fucking peanut.
Dead Rhetoric: As for Dirty, the first thing I think of when it comes to the title is an urban setting. Dirty streets, dirty buildings, dirty people. Is that what you were thinking?
Fabban: Dirty…dirty like this planet, our society, the system, you, me, people, cities. Dirty as underwear of a whore after eight hours on the street, or as the brain of whoever think is commanding us…dirty as a god. Dirty like the gears of a car.
Dead Rhetoric: Are you still doing volunteer/activist work for Greenpeace? The environment has always been a metal-centric topic, you know, so I’m curious if that tied into the new album.
Fabban: I don’t have much time lately, but when I can I help these guys with graphics, advertising campaigns etc., not only Greenpeace. On Dirty there’s a specific song that speaks about rape of nature and about the environment itself, it’s about the “manufacturing” of illness and death in a serial, continuous, systematic way. “The Factory of Death” speaks of Ilva, a huge factory on the outskirts of my hometown, a factory that spits and spews dioxins and dead, every fucking day. The classic example of how man is brainless and hopelessly schizophrenic, immoral, slimy and dirty. Money before life. Death as a result of a business. And babies are born with cancer in that town.
Dead Rhetoric: You’ve always employed a very social/human element to your lyrics, as in, examining mankind and its various flaws. Were you able to expand upon that for Dirty?
Fabban: I can write and express myself through my lyrics exclusively talking about everything that makes me sick, that pisses me off, or that terrifies me. For me, it is a way to deal with all the crap that surrounds me. And writing makes me feel good. I write lyrics about real and concrete things, the lyrics of Dirty talk about social disgust, the corrupt system of violence and immorality of people, poverty, economical and social disaster designed and implemented by the masters of the world.
It talks about the cannibalistic war of poor people and the new generation that is emerging from below, from under the ground. It talks about social relations and deviant sexual relations, and the delirious psychopath approach of people dealing with people, the lack of authenticity, of immorality, of chaos, sex, disease, drugs, madness, and the metropolitan luxury and its degradation. It talks about everything that happens in a big city, a symbol of modernity on one hand and immorality on the other, a place where people build and then destroy. I went to write the lyrics of Dirty in Los Angeles, just to have more inspiration.
Dead Rhetoric: What kind of role does [drummer] Faust play in terms of writing the album? I know he’s a gifted lyricist, so I wonder if you leverage his talents…
Fabban: Because of the distance, Bard becomes crucial when we write songs and set their structures. Usually he writes drum lines according to our instructions and when we’re satisfied, it comes the time to come to Italy and record them.
Dead Rhetoric: The Iron Maiden cover is already raising some eyebrows. What prompted you to do it?
Fabban: This is part of the game. We counted on a negative reaction from the “purists” side and on exciting reactions from our fans. It’s so much fun…so fucking cool! An Iron Maiden’s cover made by Aborym couldn’t sound in any other way…ha-ha. We played it 3/4 times faster, in our own way, with our style. We are made this way: take it or leave it. If someone does not like our style and our way of making music, they can safely listen to something else .. We will continue to sleep peacefully at night ..
Dead Rhetoric: Do you ever reflect upon some of your more chaotic days, like in the early 2000’s when Attila was still in the band? Ever wish you could do some things over again?
Fabban: The past is the past. I have beautiful memories related to that damn time, but things change. I’m still in contact with Attila, we are on good terms and I’m quite happy about it, but I do not think there will be another opportunity to work together again.
Dead Rhetoric: Has anyone ever told you that next to “Our Sentence,” “Roma Divina Urbs” is your best song?
Fabban: You’re not the first one…ha-ha. I hope you’ll like the new version of “Roma Divina Urbs” that we recorded on Dirty.
Dead Rhetoric: Finally, what’s on the agenda for the rest of 2013?
Fabban: Some gigs in August, then a fucking holiday. From September on I will start writing new songs and in December, more gigs abroad.