Know your enemy

Found this while going through one of my downloaded Tumblr archives. In this case, alas, the enemy came from within. Amebix were pioneers of crust punk in the 80s, merging anarcho-punk and heavy metal into a new sort of extreme music; they broke up in the late 80s but reformed briefly about 20 years later, after which the band’s frontman Rob Miller formed a new band, Tau Cross. And that’s where the trouble came.

Amebix were sufficiently “anarcho” that their first appearance on record was on a compilation from Crass’ record label (which later also gave us the vinyl debuts of Chumbawamba and Napalm Death, for what it’s worth), and they were the first non-US band on Alternative Tentacles. Tau Cross, on the other hand, were (are?) a bit more in the vein of latter-day Killing Joke, I think Rob and Jaz have long had similar esoteric interests from what I can see… but, to the best of my knowledge, Killing Joke never gave credit to a Holocaust denier.

Apparently the third TC album was recorded and ready to go when someone noticed Miller had thanked one Gerard Menuhin in the liner notes. If you haven’t of him (as I hadn’t before all this blew up), you may know his dad. The latter was not only one of the greatest violinists of all time, he was also very specifically named by his parents:

Obliged to find an apartment of their own, my parents searched the neighbourhood and chose one within walking distance of the park. Showing them out after they had viewed it, the landlady said: “And you’ll be glad to know I don’t take Jews.” Her mistake made clear to her, the antisemitic landlady was renounced, and another apartment found. But her blunder left its mark. Back on the street my mother made a vow. Her unborn baby would have a label proclaiming his race to the world. He would be called “The Jew”.

There is an obvious and bleak irony in Gerard Menhuin becoming a Holocaust denier when his own dad was not only Jewish but quite literally called “Jew” (Menuhin père seems to have been a bit of a shit to his kids, but that was an overreaction). Ironic or not, though, Gerry is nonetheless on the side of the team that would’ve marched his dad into the showers; I don’t know if he was active like this while the old man was still alive, but if not it didn’t take him long to become so, with his Wiki entry noting his father’s foundation booted him after discovering he’d been talking to neo-Nazi German media like National Zeitung, whose publisher FZ-Verlag (no, I don’t think they were Frank Zappa fans) printed a book by him in 2007. That was a German-only deal, but he got English language books out there in following years through such charming people as The Barnes Review.

In short, a very odd person for Rob Miller to be acknowledging in his album notes, albeit not one most people seem to know about. At any rate, when a German magazine pointed this detail out, his record label and bandmates basically responded with “what the FUCK, Rob?” and respectively terminated his contract and quit the band, whereupon he formed a new version of TC and re-recorded the album. I think this review of the latter offers a fair judgement:

First and foremost, it is not a crime to read material that you find morally reprehensible and as, Kenan Malik wrote, “…possessing a book is not the same as being sympathetic to its contents.” Indeed, reading such material is often the sign of a mind looking to understand how people manipulate data and selectively interpret events and testimony in order to come up with ludicrous statements, such as the Holocaust being a hoax. Learning what the opposite side say is how you refute their talking points. […]
However, publicly thanking such a person like Gerard Menuhin (and thereby, implicitly, giving your seal of approval) is where questions have to be asked. Although Miller has not given any indication that he is a Holocaust denier, he will have to face questions about this for a long time. Indeed, I am deeply uneasy regarding the public thanking of Menuhin, especially because (based on his two statements) Miller doesn’t seem to think it’s a big deal. Then again, Noam Chomsky never apologised for Memoire En Defense, did he?

Agree that Rob Miller shouldn’t be condemned just for reading this Holocaust denial dreck (otherwise I’d have to cancel myself just for reading The Camp of the Saints despite finding it a frankly evil book). The question, of course, is whether or not he was trying to refute Menuhin in doing so, and that’s… debatable at best; let’s look at his actual words (spelling/grammar sic) in that statement he made when all this blew up:

As a singer in a band i have always been serious about the Truth, trying to refine the material and ideas to some kind of overarching theory, i cannot simply skim the material,i have to go into it and prepare to be changed by that journey. that has happened on a number of occasions, through reading Menuhins book,through John Lash and his work,through 9/11 research,through the Europa-the last battle video series that is constantly popping up and being pushed back down on youtube.

Enough said about Menuhin. As far as I can see John Lash may be a bit odd but probably not too sketchy (though “the true successor of Mircea Eliade and the rightful heir of Joseph Campbell“… that doesn’t sound great), “9/11 research” is… yeah, and Europa: the Last Battle is actual unabashed neo-Nazi shit. I wonder how much Rob “changed” on that journey given how willing he seems to have been to do so. Bit ironic that Amebix’s first single was called “Who’s the Enemy”; eventually it turned out to be Rob Miller himself…

Anyway, the Messengers of Deception album (at least the remake of it) is actually rather good, too, which could be galling if you do want to cancel Miller for the Menuhin thing (he has been condemned for it by his own brother—who was also in Amebix—just like Menuhin was by his, so they share that too). I will confess to not having listened closely enough to determine how much if any of the content may have been coloured by his “researches”; the review I linked above, having agreed that Miller looks shady for having acknowledged Menuhin on the previous album, finally reckons “there will be those who will suggest that these lyrics are “dog-whistles” and, while they are entitled to that interpretation, there is nothing here that would suggest anything to do with Holocaust denial”, which may well be the case. Either way, though, I’m not sorry I downloaded the thing without paying for it like I did the first two Tau Cross albums.