FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Music

Canadian Crust Punks Storm of Sedition Go Off the Grid on Their Furious New 'Decivilize' LP

Listen to this Victoria, BC collective's newest batch of anti-civilization, anarchist black metal/death/crust anthems.

Storm of Sedition is part of the same Victoria, BC anarchist black metal/crust faction that claims Iskra, Not A Cost, and Black Kronstadt. It appears to be quite a tight-knit community, as the band also share members (as well as ideals) with Iskra, Crepehanger, Leper, and Mutiny. The collective's new album, Decivilize, came out today, and is absolutely blowing my mind with its furious, wickedly sharp merger of black metal, death metal, and crust punk. The combination is reminiscent of Iskra (with a lot more death metal acumen), but also brings to mind a crustier Nightfell or blacker Winds of Genocide, or an all-around more metallic Provoked. Storm of Sedition really stand in a class of their own, though, and Decivilize is ultimately one of the best releases I've heard this year.

Advertisement

Beyond their unorthodox approach to extreme music, their message is dangerous, and revolutionary—even in the context of radical leftist thought. Whereas traditional anarchists advocate for the abolition of the government in favor of a free, equal society and a total breakdown of class barriers, Storm of Sedition subscribes to an anti-political, green perspective that goes far beyond the fight against capitalist institutions and worker exploitation. They're at war with civiliation itself.

As the band explains on their website, "Civilization's domestication attempts to crush and control both our body and spirit. If we want to break free, we must avert, attack, and destroy the dominant civilized culture itself, with its many reifications and abstractions, its humanist, reason based thinking, and it's confining morality and ideologies. We must think regionally, and effectively strategize how to fight back against the seemingly endless technologization, urbanization, and industrialization happening around us. Towards an undomesticated, feral existence!"

It's an interesting concept, and one that's not without its appeal— who among us can say they've never wished to burn it all down, wipe the slate clean, and begin again? For now, Decivilize is streaming in full on Storm of Sedition's Bandcamp page (with physical releases coming this summer). I highly suggest you check it out… while you still can.

Kim Kelly is agitating on Twitter.