Merzdow Shek ‘Suicide In America & Bavarian Aquarels’
Staaltape Documentatie Serie cassette, 1987
01 Bavarian Aquarel
02 Lager
03 Caligula’s Triumph
04 Without Tears
05 Marburg - Industrie Und Polizei
06 Blast - Furnace
07 Hystorical Dioxin
08 Bhopal’Roll
09 Suicide In America
10 Drinking Bedside - Table
11 Arkandaschy Raus!
12 Polkacyde
Note: last track ‘Polkacyde’ seems to be a little sequel at end of tr#11.
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‘Merzdow Shek’ was
Mario Marzidovšek (born 1961 in Slovenia). He launched ‘Marzidovshek Minimal Laboratorium’ (MML) tape label in 1984 to release his own music and that of the local northeast Slovenia area bands. The region was active with various bands in industrial towns like Maribor, Celje, Žalec and Štajerska, where Marzidovšek lived. In Trbovlje was Laibach. In Maribor was various punk bands like Masaker or CZD and Abbildungen Varieté, an experimental music band active ca1982-1983. Three main independant labels were active in Slovenia during the mid1980s:
FV from Ljubljana,
Slovenija from Koper and
MML from Štajerska. During its 4 years of existence (1984-1988), MML released 80 cassettes of slovenian and international bands.
A technician in a local chemical factory, Marzidovšek started doing music inspired by his industrial surroundings and the many records he had collected: krautrock, european avantgarde, american minimalism and the local punk scene. He published zines, articles, visual poetry in xeroxed editions. He composed music for theater performance in 1988 (see
here). He was a painter as well. Since the 1990s, he seems to have disappeared from the music scene, even before the beginning of the war in 1992.
MML had many contacts outside Slovenia, sending tapes abroad, releasing foreign bands and international compilations. He got reviews in music magazines like Option, Sound Choice, Maximum Rock ‘n’ Roll or NME. He lived in the Netherlands in 1987-88 when Staaltape released this tape. Presumably a live recording of industrial, looped synth music, with elements of Z’ev druming sound, Laibach ‘marching music’ and synth industrial soundscapes.
The information for this post comes from:
- Rajko Muršič [+]: ‘On the relationship of Global and Local Music Production: Mario Marzidovšek and his Independent Label Marzidovshek minimalaborato­rium’, Ljubljana conference, 1996. [+] Included in the following:
- ‘Rock’n'Roll and Nationalism: A Multinational Perspective’, Mark Yoffe and Andrea Collins, ed., Cambridge Scholars Press, 2005 [+].
- ‘CMARNET, Croatian Metal And Rock’ forum, October 22, 2007 [+]
- A Hogon’s Industrial Guide blog, November 13th, 2007 [+] A big thank you!
Download.