Država
| Država | |
|---|---|
| Laibach | |
| publication | 1985 |
| length | 4:31 |
| Genre (s) | Post-industrial |
| Label | ŠKUC |
| album | Laibach |
Država ( sl. 'The State') is a piece of music by the Slovenian band Laibach . It appeared in 1985 on their debut album Laibach .
Emergence
The first version of the piece of music was recorded in 1982. The version released on the debut album was recorded in September 1983 in the Studio Metro in Ljubljana and released in April 1985 by ŠKUC-Ropot in Slovenia . Since the band was banned from using the name Laibach until 1987, the LP was released without it in order to be able to circumvent the ban. According to the band, a specialty is the improvised method of sampling , as there were no samplers back then and this was a tabula rasa .
music
The music is “monumental, overwhelming and reminiscent of the soundtrack of the film ' Where Eagles Dare '”.
text
The text is reproduced four times, "that is, four invocations or battle cries ". The second rendition is accompanied by a speech by former Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito , "in which the fraternity and equality of the nation is invoked". Tito announced that much blood had been shed for the brotherhood and unity of the Yugoslav nations and that no one would attempt to destroy that brotherhood and unity from within. The demand for unity at all costs contradicts the statement "all freedom is allowed, authority here belongs to the people" . Renata Salecl also addresses a corresponding contradiction within the administrative structure of Yugoslavia in her book The Spoils of Freedom: Psychoanalysis and Feminism after the Fall of Socialism ; the multitude of possible interpretations of this contradiction led to the breakup of the system; at this point elements that had previously formed the ideological structure became independent and began to function as “floating signifieds ”. According to Winifred Griffin, Laibach had been active in the manipulation and re-articulation of these “floating signifieds”.
Music video
Directed by Daniel Landin a 1986 published was black and white - music video that is part of the Performance No Fire Escape in Hell was. In contrast to the LP version, this version uses the text of the introductory piece Cari amici . Laibach stands on an illuminated stage in front of an emblem with the band's typical black cross on a white background. The singer, Milan Fras, is standing in the middle, wearing a suit and has taken a stiff posture. Hanser describes his expression as “ authoritarian and concentrated, dogged when he yells into the microphone”. He appears "frightening and at the same time ridiculous because of the effort." The drummers positioned next to him wear rolled-up shirts, and the NSK symbol can be seen on their ties . According to Hanser, they appear “ fanatical , dangerous and unscrupulous” and, according to Alexei Monroe's description, act as “ depersonalized automata ”; their robot-like movements suggest "rather lobotomized Nazi recruits than rock drummers who are pounding under the weight of their own ego". The drummers as well as the trumpeters and hornblowers (who often just mimic the creation of the sounds ) stare forward in a rigid position and with fanatical, emotionless expression. Their mechanical and synchronous movements suggest drilled military drummers who are incapable of their own thoughts or gestures. The guitarist “doesn't fit into the picture at all because of his instrument” and “disrupts the common notion of a totalitarian spectacle”.
"The dancers, the crowd, the 'people'" move to the rhythm given by Laibach. Before the first text reproduction or invocation, only Laibach exists on the illuminated stage, "which is surrounded by nothing". With the invocation the individual (the dancer Michael Clark) appears briefly, “who is more of a body than a person and makes turning movements as if it were being whirled back and forth” and is “still in nothing”. The singer "waits and lets his will be announced with drums and trumpets". The second invocation is accompanied by Tito's speech; the individual appears again, this time longer, and jumps from one point to the next in rotating movements. The stage appears briefly in the background "and can also be guessed by the flashing light". With the third invocation, the crowd runs towards the stage and “tries to achieve an orderly choreography under the strict gaze of Laibach”. As soon as the dancers have found a position in which they hold up the right one at an angle with their left arm, “the presence of Laibach is no longer necessary because everything now happens by itself”. In nowhere, a body “snakes or crawls along the ground”. With the last invocation "a rotating organism breaks down into two parts that rotate out of the picture". The stage "seems to tremble, to succumb to a shock that calms down". Finally, Laibach can be seen again standing on the illuminated stage and surrounded by nothing.
Due to the fourfold invocation and the title Država "it is imperative to read this work with Althusser ", says Eva-Maria Hanser. Althusser "develops in his text ' Ideology and ideological state apparatus ' a theory of ideological invocation: a four-fold system of invocation ensures the smooth functioning of the masses". The individual is “invoked as a free subject” and “thus receives recognition”. Attention is drawn to his participation in society, his place in society. The invocation of the individual as a subject presupposes an invoking absolute SUBJECT to which the subject submits. The second invocation is reinforced by Tito's speech, "whose source is not visible, could come from anywhere and is therefore omnipotent or appears". Here Tito is “set as the absolute SUBJECT and Laibach functions here as its doubling, as a guarantee that IT exists, as an apparatus that regulates belief in it through a ritual practice”. The dancer as subject, “visually placed in context with the stage”, “submits voluntarily because of the invocation, the SUBJECT has become part of his world”. With the third invocation “the mutual recognition of the subjects and the SUBJECT, of the subjects among themselves and of the subject itself”; as a guarantee that the subjects belong to the SUBJECT, it must recognize them as well. The joint participation of the dancers in the ritual "also refers to the mutual recognition among themselves that they are all subjects of this SUBJECT". The crawling body in nowhere could mean, on the one hand, “that the subject recognizes itself as such and accentuates it with this humiliating position”, “on the other hand it seems as if this body is trying to steal away secretly, but is threatened by it to end in nothing, to sink into insignificance, thus to lose one's place in society ”. The events after the last invocation “can be read as a reference to the guarantee: the SUBJECT persists even after the shock and the subjects recognize themselves as what they are, everything remains in order if they do not (the dancer organism dissolves) the order threatens to overturn, which is shown by the shock ”. Laibach thus stages itself as a totalitarian state "and thus also refers to the concert as an ideological state apparatus, as a ritual event of invocation through which ideologies are transported", at the same time the performance refers to the repressive state apparatus, "which is based on violence, namely with the violence of the voice, the authoritarian demeanor and the violence with which the drummers hit their instruments, an act that is reminiscent of the beating of (unruly) individuals ”.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e Eva-Maria Hanser: Ideotopie . Playing with the ideology and utopia of 'Laibach art'. Vienna 2010, p. 26–29 ( univie.ac.at [PDF; accessed on September 27, 2011]).
- ^ Donald Campbell: Laibach: Project and Performance Highlights: 1980-1989. the Slovenian, February 2005, accessed September 27, 2011 .
- ↑ a b c LAIBACH - Laibach. (No longer available online.) Laibach, archived from the original on October 9, 2012 ; accessed on September 27, 2011 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ A b c d Winifred Griffin: Laibach: The Instrumentality of the State Machine. ARTMargins, August 23, 1999, accessed September 27, 2011 .
