God Speed You! Black Emperor – Transphobes Must Eat Shit And Die Alone

Godspeed You! Black Emperor is a Canadian post-rock band that formed in Montreal, Canada in 1994. They took their name from a 1976 Japanese black and white documentary about a Japanese biker gang called The Black Emperors. The band has a dedicated cult following and is credited with being influential or influenced in the genre. Their music is mainly instrumental, incorporating field and spoken word recordings to create ambient and rousing soundscapes. For context, they also project vintage grainy, gritty analogue and digital films as a backdrop to their less than kinetic, mostly seated shoegaze type live shows that add atmosphere to the mood and power of their music. I was vaguely aware of them over the years but never fully immersed myself in their work, finding their recordings overly sluggish and ponderous, having found my ‘fix’ with other bands like Explosions In The Sky, Sigur Ros, Mogwai, and This Will Destroy You. I saw GSY!BE live recently. Mat Ball of BIG|BRAVE opened solo with some ‘experimental’ guitarwork. Interesting but tiring. The GSY!BE show moved me but I will admit that there were times when I wish they’d shorten the intros and outros and get on with the truly meaty stuff.

The crescendo.

The rousing climax.

They are a brilliant dystopian post-national Canadian symphony orchestra.

The band identifies themselves as anti-capitalists and anarchists which might explain their lack of commercial success; but who really wants that, right? They are not pop divas or manufactured psyop hit makers for which I am always thankful. True artists and activists must suffer for their ‘art’…right? If you sell out like U2 you will be rich! Founding member and lead non-vocal activist Efrim Menuck said, “All music is political, right? You either make music that pleases the king and his court, or you make music for the serfs outside the walls. We started making this noise together when we were young and broke. Whatever politics we had were born out of living through a time when the dominant narrative was that everything was fine.”

Well everything is still not fine! Go anarchy!

Well, the band is thirty years older and most likely still broke because they want it that way, and still not making music for the king and his court but everything is still not ‘fine’ because of the current and past ruling classes and their destructive but progressive ideologies. It’s one thing to be non-vocal, liner note critics of the Satanic genocidal Israeli policy against Palestinians which any sane or moral person would be against, or anti-environmentalist economic development and student protest suppression, but where are your ideals when your government finances and encourages corporate government welfare and warfare and the destruction of anything good that allows you to practice your art? What if your right to self expression and freedom of speech are eliminated? What if they come for your guns, guitars, aaps and microphones? Are you conflicted in what you are active against? Is this the whole point of your anarchy? Titles like ‘The Dead Flag Blues’ or ‘Slow Riot For A New Zero Kanada’ could be referential to former globalist clown Prime Minister and W.E.F. shill Trudeau’s promise to make Canada a post national state through the corporate, authoritarian destruction of anything good and moral and prosperous for the common man, woman and child.

“Transphobes must eat shit and die alone” is quite the pronouncement from a non-verbal, non-vocal instrumental political activist protest band. My personal preferences lie with the separation of art, music and politics. I either like any of it or I don’t. I remember going to a gig by SoCal skate punks, The Circle Jerks in Edmonton way back in the mid 80’s. Down Syndrome opened. The crowd came for a hard core punk rock show but the opening number turned out to be a spitting monologue by Keith Morris against Ronald Reagan and some injustices of the time. The crowd shouted them down, to “shut up and play”!!!. They came for a show and not a political rally and sermon. If you are an art group, musical or otherwise, fronting a political action group, your art had better be good. In GSY!BE’s case, it is good, really good, but it would be better if they left the edgy pronouncements out, especially if none of your group are ‘trans’. Why not advocate for other oppressed minorities, against the real monsters of this world?

‘Pedophiles and child molesters eat shit and die alone.’

‘Woman and baby killers and rapists eat shit and die alone.’

‘Cultural Marxists, Socialists, and Fascists eat shit and die alone.’

‘Globalist elites eat shit and die alone.’

‘Genocidal transhumanist depopulists eat shit and die alone.’

Try taping these slogans to your amplifiers.

Why not just execute the offending monsters and skip the vulgarity of eating shit?

Might you grow your fan base and still stay true to your art and selves?

Ultimately we all die alone, even if in a mass casualty event which is becoming more likely these days.

If you want some awesome music for the apocalypse, GSY!BE might suit.

Did I mention that they are fucking awesomely brilliant?

God speed us all!