“Anything that can be too easily described doesn’t need to be recreated. If the vocabulary already exists, it’s redundant.”
Anyone who has spent any time on the internet in the last decade knows how quickly one’s perception of an object, person, or event can shift from familiar to strange – and, arguably, it is this moment of jarring unfamiliarity that we all seek whenever we flip through TV channels or browse the internet – that which can, in some respect, shake us from our routines. Like the terrifying man behind the diner in David Lynch’s film Mulholland Drive, L.A.’s Bestial Mouths embody a surreal and vaguely menacing state of strange.
Their music crosses boundaries with the same visionary spirit as seminal underground acts Swans, Skinny Puppy, or PiL, incorporating dramatic swells of dark synth for a deceptively polished finish that belies the raw terror lurking beneath. Of their sound, Christopher Myrick (synths and co-lyricist) says, “I’m influenced by post-punk, goth, industrial, synth pop, death rock, power electronics, shoe-gaze and no-wave, all to some extent. Lynette (Cerezo, vocals and lyrics) is probably more into ethereal goth stuff than I am. Gus (Aldana, the other half of the Mouths’ synth section) is more into breakcore and techno. Gus and Jessica (Reuter, drums and samples) are definitely more into metal than Lynette or I. I think we try to combine this stuff in new ways though, I think we try to make something we haven’t heard before. Anything that can be too easily described doesn’t need to be recreated. If the vocabulary already exists, it’s redundant.”
Every member of the band is drawn to artists that are in some way groundbreaking or transgressive. Reuter says, “I hate genres as a rule, but I guess I enjoy most of the stuff classified as ‘Riot Grrrl.’ I also really love Unwound, and sort of idolize Sara Lund. She’s so precise and inventive but still so warm and dreamy. I know they don’t exactly fit in with that genre, but hey, they were still on KRS! That was my main source of music in high school. It seemed like all my favorite groups were on that label – Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill, Heavens to Betsy – but mostly Sleater-Kinney. The thing about S-K that I really loved was the fact that they were so pretty and melodic but still so pissed off! I’ve seen them a few times live, and they had this wonderful energy that was infectious…you couldn’t leave a Sleater-Kinney show without feeling like you were going to jump out of your skin. I guess that’s something I took away and wanted to bring to Bestial Mouths…just the live element that’s so raw and in-the-moment. You can’t really capture that on records.” Aldana notes that his parents’ involvement in the L.A. punk scene was a formative influence, followed by his introduction to drum and bass. “In high school, I learned about breakcore, which was a huge influence on me. I heard a Venetian Snares record in the record shop I used to hang out in and I felt like it really combined punk aggression with the futurist aesthetics of the drum and bass that I was into. It challenged me and inspired me to make challenging music. To me, challenging music is music that is confrontational in some way; it forces the listener to address it. It isn’t background music that you can have a drink and a conversation to – it is music that comes at you head-on and grabs you by the ears and commands your attention. That inspires my solo music and my work in the band – I hope it challenges people.
Of their name, Myrick explains, “I think we particularly liked the idea of portraying this musical project as a mouthpiece for something outside of ourselves, as though we were channeling something animalistic that wasn’t consciously a part of us.” The same philosophy extends to their lyrical approach, says Cerezo. “Cut-up and automatic writing helps us to form ideas. Usually a theme or subject emerges and from there and we fill in the rest.” Myrick adds that, “[cut-up technique] encourages you to explore subjects that wouldn’t normally come to you. When I was young, I was really interested in William Burroughs and that grew into interest in the French New Novel Movement, surrealism, modernism/postmodernism and experiments with narrative in general. I’m not sure exactly to what degree any of that is reflected in our lyrics, except that maybe we have a tendency towards fragmentation and stream-of-consciousness.”
The band is currently on a mini-tour of the Pacific Northwest, with shows in Eugene, Portland, Seattle, and their first-ever Canadian gig in Vancouver – a city which boasts an important historical role in industrial music as the wellspring for both Skinny Puppy and Front Line Assembly. Myrick enthusiastically acknowledges these influences on his own work. “I have totally sat around listing to Skinny Puppy over and over, trying to program something like the metallic sounding synth stuff, or trying to duplicate their arpeggiations, especially ‘Assimilate’. I also really love the early ‘Nerve War’ FLA stuff. It’s so good! I’ve read about how they dislike it, but I just can’t get my brain around that. I think I tend to prefer more dirty sounding EBM and minimal recordings.”
Bestial Mouths EARTH from Bestial Mouths on Vimeo.
Courtesy of artists Steven R Gilmore for Puppy and Dave McKean for FLA, each has a definitive visual aesthetic that is equally important for one to fully experience their work; Bestial Mouths follow suit with their own unique style. As demonstrated in director Niko Sonnberger’s music videos for “Small Prey” and “Earth”, surreal settings are populated by otherworldly humanoid creatures, arcane symbols, and mysterious objects, while the band members themselves either adopt strange personas or undergo transformations that disrupt the viewer’s expectations. Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Holy Mountain immediately comes to mind while viewing these collaborations with Sonnberger, clearly influenced by surrealism and transgressive art. Aldana elaborates: “We have similar aesthetic preferences and tastes, and [Sonnberger] is well informed regarding film, music, and literature. That mutual appreciation and understanding has made it extremely easy to work with her and communicate ideas, with excellent results. For both videos, Niko came to us with the concept and her ideas for how they should look. She is super talented at getting the feel for the music and visually representing it. She also has an excellent knack for getting together amazing crews to help her realize her vision. We usually have a meeting where we talk about her ideas and bounce some of our own ideas back and forth, but in the end, I feel as though we have such a deep mutual understanding that we can let her take charge because she is so good at conveying our sound through video in a way that truly represents us.”
Bestial Mouths WHITE EYES from Bestial Mouths on Vimeo.
Aldana extends the same criteria to the larger community, in terms of the necessary elements for a strong music scene. “In my experience, a scene really needs to feel like a community to be successful. I’ve run a few house venues in Santa Barbara where I went to school, and I was friends with the other “venues” (houses with names) as well. It seems like the most successful ones were the ones where everyone pitches in, and everyone is rooting for each other. There is always a little competitiveness between artists, but the overall feeling is that everyone is feeding off of each others energy and watching each others shows and really listening to each others music. Beyond the people and the community, the first thing a local scene needs to be successful is venues, whether they are houses, clubs, warehouses, whatever. I feel like I’ve seen a few communities where there were so many talented people but there was no space to share their art.”
The upcoming mini-tour is in support of their debut self-titled LP, produced by David Psutka of Egyptrixx and released on Clan Destine in June 2013. Cerezo says of the songwriting process for the album, written after their return from Europe in November 2012, “With every album it would be ideal to tour a lot with the songs before recording – I always change my vocal delivery a little and perfect it as I perform live, so I wish I had a chance to do that before that recording but we had just returned from touring and didn’t really have time after writing these songs. On this particular recording session I wish I could also go back and not have had a cold. I was really sick when we tracked my vocals.” Her concern is unwarranted, however; like Diamanda Galas, the very sound of Cerezo’s powerful voice is an indictment, a terrifying call to reckoning.
Whether darkness is where Bestial Mouths begins or ends, the goal, says Aldana, is seditious. “We are all definitely very inspired by art that could be considered dark, but not exclusively. We enjoy art that moves us; sometimes it is confrontational and harsh, and sometimes it is beautiful and soft. Either way, I think the most important art is art that makes you feel something. Our brand of music tends towards the dark side naturally due to our influences, but we don’t set out to create something dark. We set out to create music and performances that are provocative and make people feel. If you are disturbed by our sounds, or you think they’re harsh and abrasive, or you are overwhelmed, or you thoroughly enjoy it and are attracted to it, you are being forced to address your body and your mind and think about why it is you are affected by it. That self reflection is an essential part of being alive; we want to affect people’s consciousness. We want people to feel something. We want people to remember that they are alive.”
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