Fear can lead people to form irrational opinions, and cameras can amplify them, both within and without. That’s one explanation for 2016, at least, but it’s certainly nothing new. Back in 2011, the English-language Iranian network PressTV filmed a documentary that focused in part on the English Defence League (EDL), a far-right group whose focus on barring Muslims from entering the UK sounds depressingly familiar on these shores. With cameras rolling, a not-ready-for-primetime EDL member told PressTV reporters that a shadowy “they” were “trying to put Iraqi law down on London.” “It’s the Muslamic law,” he elucidated. “They’ve got Muslamic rayguns nowadays.”
One of the viewers of that immortal clip was Blake Scott, guitarist and vocalist for the Melbourne punk band The Peep Tempel. The EDL video was just one star in a constellation of fear that Scott encountered—one news article reported that jihadists were entering battle with methamphetamine coursing through their systems, a claim that’s been substantiated by numerous respectable outlets that nevertheless feels calibrated to provoke a certain response: ISIS are on their way, and there’s nothing we can do to stop them.
Inspired (or repulsed, to put it less delicately) by the cultural moment and by the similarly fear-mongering Reclaim Australia movement, Scott and his band—bassist Stewart Rayner and drummer Steven Carter—bashed out a screaming two-minute response called “Rayguns,” the video for which we’re pleased to be premiering. “Hello,” Scott calmly begins, blithely ignoring the tone set by his own shrieking guitar. “Hello there dainty fascists / the call’s out to serve your writ.”
The tongue-in-cheek clip finds him sitting at a desk delivering his news with a becalmed smile. “The regime’s coming,” he says with a grin, “and they’re all on ice.” There’s a smug swagger to the way the trio bash away. Like Mclusky before them, they play as if their instruments are particularly vicious dogs straining at the end of a leash, knowing full well that they are all that stands between you and annihilation, and clearly reveling in the power. It may not swing any elections, but what other attitude are you supposed to have when telling Nazi punks to fuck off?
“Rayguns” is the first single from Joy, the band’s third record, which is out October 14 on Wing Sing. Steel yourself against the coming darkness and check it out below.
Joy track list
1. Kalgoorlie
2. Totality
3. We You Forgot
4. Rayguns
5. Constable
6. Don’t Race
7. Alexander
8. Neuroplasticity
9. Go Slow
10. Brains
Joy is out October 14 via Wing Sing.
