Image: Kalle StilleDIÄT present a bleak and morose punk. Though the sound is probably more reminiscent to something like Crisis or Night Time era Killing Joke, like it or not, the band they get likened to at every turn is Total Control.Of course there’s worse bands to be compared to, but to be fair, DIÄT foster their own take on post punk. It's one they describe as ‘tough new wave.’The Berlin based band’s upcoming debut album Positive Energy is released this week but you can listen to it here first.The band have been busy with an appearance at Beserktown and an upcoming spot at Toronto’s Not Dead Yet fest, an LP launch in Berlin with Merchandise and the Blackest Ever Black five-year anniversary party at Berlin’s infamous Berghain.We had a chat to the band’s Chris Onton.Noisey: One of the album highlights is "Sinkhole". What is that about?
Chris Onton: I think the listener will be able to work it out. The lyrics were originally written for a really poppy tune that Josh and Tobi ended up using for their other band, Fluffers, with the intention of giving all that pop a dark undertone. The outcome of one very final event will hopefully frame it as either melancholic yet hilarious prophecy or render it absolute forgettable nonsense. I questioned the inclusion of a lyric sheet with this one.You have done Beserktown and are about to do Not Dead Yet. What do you think of these larger punk fests?
The format of gigs like Paco's Exeorx Fest and Ellis' Static Shock fests in London totally works and I get the feeling that's what Not Dead Yet and probably stuff like New York's Alright and Maggot Fest also pull off. A bunch of shows organised at the venues in town bands normally play at but with a tonne of out of towners and everything of a certain level of quality that creates a festival atmosphere. However, the traditional big venue style festival just absolutely does not work for punk. The best thing about DIY in my opinion is how democratic it is and as soon as someone is put up on that big venue pedestal, it's so hard to make it feel relevant and like anything other than classic entertainment. Berserktown was weird man! Props to G for putting together such an insane collection of bands but there was something so strange about it. It reminded me of an episode of Ninja Turtles or X-Men I watched as a kid where they were kidnapped by an alien race and taken to another galaxy somewhere to battle all the other superhero teams from the other galaxies in a sort gladiator style arena for the entertainment of their kidnappers.You are living in Berlin. Has that placed reached saturation point as far as 20-something Australians?
Ha, maybe, though I don't think our immigrant bunch is as unbearable as all the travellers who come through and complain about not being able to find a good flat white. Berlin, in my fairly uneducated opinion, exists in a strange middle ground between capitalism and socialism but if a bunch of confident young Australian artists or entrepreneurs move in and fill gaps in the market for niche products like craft beer, hot breakfasts or commercial galleries then the balance could find itself tipped in the favour of turning the place into another typical western European city.The guys themselves absolutely wouldn't stand for it but it'd be great for Josh and I if Diät allowed us to transcend all the other pricks just like us to be retrospectively lumped together with the older generation of Australian musicians here, guys like Jon Evans and Julian Percy… they're an interesting bunch, still operating on the outer and creating dark industrial shit since long before it was associated with a place like Berlin. 'Noise' and generally antisocial harsh sounding shit is big in all kinds of music from punk to techno at the moment but no one in the mid 90s was forking out €300 for a Throbbing Gristle record or paying attention to what blokes like Jon were doing in his dusty squat. They're definitely not young anymore and I'm pretty sure they're not wealthy but they're still doing their thing and on their own terms. They're quite unlikely role models and have chosen a path so far from the Australian dream of a house with a lawn and whatever else their generation back in Australia stands for and for us that's actually something to aspire to and maybe the best thing that not living in Perth or Canberra can offer guys like us.
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Chris Onton: I think the listener will be able to work it out. The lyrics were originally written for a really poppy tune that Josh and Tobi ended up using for their other band, Fluffers, with the intention of giving all that pop a dark undertone. The outcome of one very final event will hopefully frame it as either melancholic yet hilarious prophecy or render it absolute forgettable nonsense. I questioned the inclusion of a lyric sheet with this one.You have done Beserktown and are about to do Not Dead Yet. What do you think of these larger punk fests?
The format of gigs like Paco's Exeorx Fest and Ellis' Static Shock fests in London totally works and I get the feeling that's what Not Dead Yet and probably stuff like New York's Alright and Maggot Fest also pull off. A bunch of shows organised at the venues in town bands normally play at but with a tonne of out of towners and everything of a certain level of quality that creates a festival atmosphere. However, the traditional big venue style festival just absolutely does not work for punk. The best thing about DIY in my opinion is how democratic it is and as soon as someone is put up on that big venue pedestal, it's so hard to make it feel relevant and like anything other than classic entertainment. Berserktown was weird man! Props to G for putting together such an insane collection of bands but there was something so strange about it. It reminded me of an episode of Ninja Turtles or X-Men I watched as a kid where they were kidnapped by an alien race and taken to another galaxy somewhere to battle all the other superhero teams from the other galaxies in a sort gladiator style arena for the entertainment of their kidnappers.You are living in Berlin. Has that placed reached saturation point as far as 20-something Australians?
Ha, maybe, though I don't think our immigrant bunch is as unbearable as all the travellers who come through and complain about not being able to find a good flat white. Berlin, in my fairly uneducated opinion, exists in a strange middle ground between capitalism and socialism but if a bunch of confident young Australian artists or entrepreneurs move in and fill gaps in the market for niche products like craft beer, hot breakfasts or commercial galleries then the balance could find itself tipped in the favour of turning the place into another typical western European city.The guys themselves absolutely wouldn't stand for it but it'd be great for Josh and I if Diät allowed us to transcend all the other pricks just like us to be retrospectively lumped together with the older generation of Australian musicians here, guys like Jon Evans and Julian Percy… they're an interesting bunch, still operating on the outer and creating dark industrial shit since long before it was associated with a place like Berlin. 'Noise' and generally antisocial harsh sounding shit is big in all kinds of music from punk to techno at the moment but no one in the mid 90s was forking out €300 for a Throbbing Gristle record or paying attention to what blokes like Jon were doing in his dusty squat. They're definitely not young anymore and I'm pretty sure they're not wealthy but they're still doing their thing and on their own terms. They're quite unlikely role models and have chosen a path so far from the Australian dream of a house with a lawn and whatever else their generation back in Australia stands for and for us that's actually something to aspire to and maybe the best thing that not living in Perth or Canberra can offer guys like us.
'Positive Energy' is out Sept 18 through Iron Lung and Adagio830 records.