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Christian Death is a band name that originally applied to a Los Angeles Death Rock group during the Post Punk era in the early 1980s, but after some major line up changes (which resulted at one point, during the mid 1990s, in two bands with the name Christian Death), it became the name of a band popular within the British/European Goth scene during the late 1980s, despite there not being a single member left from the original Los Angeles Death Rock band. That later incarnation evolved into a hard rock group during the 1990s while, at the same time, members from the earlier incarnation got back together performing more traditional Goth and Death Rock . ORIGINAL GROUP After getting involved in the Los Angeles Punk scene and playing in a few local bands, vocalist Rozz Williams founded Christian Death in October 1979 at age 16 (born Roger Painter - in Pomona California - 6 November 1963 ) with James McGearty (Bass), George Belanger (drums), and a guitarist named Jay brought in from a previous band Rozz had been in called Daucus Karota. The band name was originally a satirical play on words derived from the designer brand 'Christian Dior'. The group's first performance infront of a live audience was at a Castration Squad gig in 1980, when Castration Squad invited Christian Death on stage to play a couple songs. Through out 1980 and 1981 the band would play many shows with 45 Grave , another LA deathrock group, though they would also play shows with standard punk bands like Social Distortion and The Adolescents . While Rozz and Christian Death were in effect playing what would eventually be considered pioneering gothic rock (or Death Rock, as it was being called in the US at the time), the band were actually not all that aware of the developing Gothic Rock scene on the other side of the Atlantic and had not yet heard Bauhaus or any of the other goth bands. They had mostly been into local west coast punk like The Germs and The Ally Cats as well as early 1970s glam rock, metal, and pre-punk stuff like David Bowie , T Rex , The Stooges , the The New York Dolls , Alice Cooper , and Kiss . They also had a liking for some of the British post punk bands around at the time like The Fall and Wire , as well as old 60s hippy music like The Doors and Jefferson Airplane . Despite inluences from west coast punk, by the beginning of the 1980s, the group were not too happy with the local LA punk scene, especially the crowd that liked Black Flag and the Circle Jerks , claiming that much of that audience hated punk a few years earlier and were all about beating up punks, but started cutting their hair short and beating up hippies instead after punk became more cool. In February of 1981, the band went on hiatus and Rozz Williams concentrated on a side project with Ron Athey called Premature Ejaculation , but Christian Death got back together that summer, with guitarist Rikk Agnew (from The Adolescents and D.I. ) replacing Jay. A compilation album featuring several local punk and death rock acts, Hell Comes To Your House (1981), was released that year. The track that Christian Death contributed, ''Dogs'', came from studio sessions financed by McGearty. The songs from those sessions would later be released in France as the Deathwish EP (1984). Their appearance on the Hell Comes To Your House compilation got them signed to Frontier Records, which released their debut album Only Theatre Of Pain in March 1982. This album featured death rock anthems such as "Spiritual Cramp" and "Romeo's Distress". The album received critical acclaim from the music press and got condemned on a religious television program about supposed "satanic influences". Over in England, despite the album's initially limited availability, ''Only Theatre of Pain'' would have a stong influence on many of those goth groups that had come after Bauhaus, including Sex Gang Children and Death Cult . Drug use and internal fighting started to lead to the band's decay. By late 1982, George Belanger and Rikk Agnew were gone from the band and were replaced by Eva Ortiz (guitar and backing vocals) and China (drums). After their first gig with local band called Pompeii 99 , Michael Montana replaced Eva on guitar. Christian Death and Pompeii 99 had planned on touring together in Europe, occasioned by the Continental release of Only Theatre Of Pain on French label L'Invitation au Suicide, but by the end of 1982, Christian Death had broken up. ROZZ WILLIAMS AND POMPEII 99 By mid 1983, the issue of the Christian Death/Pompeii 99 European tour still stood. Though Rozz Williams had been stuck at his moms house for six months without a band, he had made the acquaitance of Pompeii 99 and found certain common artistic ground with them. As a result, the core members of Pompeii 99 -- Valor Kand (guitar and vocals), Gitane DeMone (keyboards and vocals), and David Glass (drums)-- decided to end that band and join up with Rozz. Constance Smith (bass) was brought in to complete the lineup. Rozz wanted to revive the name Daucus Karota for the new group but Yann Farcy, head of L'Invitation au Suicide, was insistent that a band called "Christian Death" play the scheduled shows in Europe to support Only Theatre Of Pain 's release there. There was some protest within the group about keeping the Christian Death name for the new band, especially from Rozz, but the old moniker ultimately remained in place. The name "means different things to all of us," Valor Kand would assert a year later. For him, the name promoted martyrism as a positive example. The French album cover for '' Only Theatre Of Pain '' featured the painting "Andromaque" by Georges Rochegrosse , depicting the ancient Romans method of "Christian death." Before their departure for Europe, the band performed around Los Angeles and appeared on TV show ''Media Blitz'' where they mimed to a couple tracks from ''Only Theatre Of Pain''. They finally performed in Paris on 12 February 1984 and continued their European tour until June. They experienced significant financial difficulty and were effectively stranded in Europe until the promoters offered to send them to Rockfield Studios in Monmouth , Wales to record a new album. This album, Catastrophe Ballet , featured a change in Rozz's style. While ''Only Theatre of Pain'' and the ''Deathwish'' EP had Rozz presenting a rhythmic spoken word style with an almost Androgynous pitch to his voice, ''Catastrophe Ballet'' shows a richer, less harsh side to his stylings, with more influence from David Bowie and Lou Reed . Rather than the occult-oriented shock lyrics from the first album, the singer showed a new-found interest in Surrealism and the Dada Movement . Gitane DeMone shared these interests, and the synergy between them helped cultivate the musical change from the old band's murky, spooky punk to a more elegant, romantic strain of guitar-driven rock. Album notes (to later reissues if not the original release) give all compositional credit to Valor Kand, although the song "Sleepwalk" originated from the first era of Christian Death. ("That's fine; he didn't play it right," ex-guitarist Rikk Agnew would quip years later about Kand's appropriation of his material.) Constance Smith left the band following the recording of the album and was replaced in live shows by Dave Roberts from Sex Gang Children . While in England, the band was received by British audiences better than they thought they would be. Sex Gang Children and Specimen had warned them that British audiences, especially at the Batcave, were not very exciting and never asked for encores. However, Christian Death did get a good response and the audience did want encores from them. At this time, many people were quick to label them with the goth tag. However, the group tended to pride themselves on doing their own thing. Their sound and look (their imagery being Rozz's idea) was something they had developed before the goth scene at places like the Batcave had opened up. Shortly after the recording of Catastrophe Ballet , Rozz got his mother to send him a plane ticket to return home, leaving the ex-Pompeii 99 faction stranded in Europe working odd jobs. The rest of the group returned to LA in the autumn of 1984, reunited with Rozz and recorded a new album called Ashes with partial funding from Yann Farcy for another L'Invitation au Suicide release. Released in 1985, the album featured guest musicians Randy Wilde (bass), Eric Westfall (violin, accordion synth), Bill Swain (tuba), Richard Hurwitz (trumpet) and Michael Andraes (clarinet). The album closed with ''Of The Wound'', featuring Sevan Kand (the infant son of Valor and Gitane) crying to a haunting score and harsh, surrealistic poetry spoken by Williams. They played gigs in 1985 to promote ''Ashes'' with Jeff Williams (bass) and Barry Galvin (guitar) joining the lineup. The tour ended with the Path of Sorrows extravaganza at Los Angeles' Roxy Theatre on 6 April , which featured films, a banquet, a program, and Rozz changing costumes four times during the show. The live album The Decomposition Of Violets , documenting a Hollywood performance from this period (and one of Williams' last with the band), would soon appear. VALOR'S CHRISTIAN DEATH After this American tour, Rozz left the band. Valor and the other remaining Pompeii 99 members had already planned an Italian tour, and made an agreement with Rozz to rename the band "Sin And Sacrifice". However, during the Italian tour, since Valor had taken over on vocals, many fans thought Valor was Rozz. Later in 1985, when the remaining members were low on cash and stranded in Italy, they released an EP ''The Wind Kissed Pictures'' under the name ''For Sin And Sacrifice Must We Die A Christian Death''. Aside from Valor Kand, Gitane Demone, and David Glass, other contributions to this EP were Barry Galvin (guitar), Johann Schumann (bass), and a childs voice, once again, contributed by Sevan Kand. After the release of ''The Wind Kissed Pictures'' EP, Valor, Gitane, and David Glass went back to the name Christian Death, despite Rozz's wishes, and had allegedly been performing songs from ''Only Theatre of Pain'', despite the fact that none of them had been involved in the making of that album. The new band was also turned into a corporation with the Christian Death Society in 1985. All shareholders had to be screened and display a "sympathetic affection" for this "society" before being sold shares. The new Christian Death, under Valor's leadership, managed to make enough money off ''The Wind Kissed Pictures'' EP to get them out of Italy and into a small one bedroom place in England, where Valor had citizenship, since he was born in Australia . After arranging for a couple of concerts, they managed to get some more studio time back at Rockfield Studios in Wales, where ''Catastrophe Ballet'' had been recorded. Here they recorded ''Atrocities''. Released in 1986, this was the first full length Christian Death album without Rozz Williams . Without the Surrealist and Dadaist lyrics of Rozz, ''Atrocities'', a Concept Album , was meant to reflect the time and place of World War II . Containing the same line up as the ''Wind Kissed Pictures'', the quality of ''Atrocities'' owed a lot to guitarist/songwriter Barry Galvin (aka Bari Bari). Much of the sound of Christian Death on ''Atrocities'' and the ''Wind Kissed Pictures'' was due to Galvin's guitar style and composing skills. Unfortunately, Galvin, along with Johann Schumann, left the group upon the completion of ''Atrocities'' and both went on to form Mephisto Walz . After Christian Death recorded ''The Scriptures'' (released in 1987), David Glass also left and, during the 1990s, ended up joining Mephisto Walz. In 1988, Valors' Christian Death toured with Red Lorry Yellow Lorry , a Goth group from Leeds, England. There was a great deal of tension between these two groups and Valor ended up getting arrested for punching the other groups manager. Gitane Demone left Christian Death in 1989, and her former lover Valor, for an attempted jazz career. This left Valor Kand as the last Pompeii 99 member with the Christian Death name. In 1990, Valor formed the Christian Death Militia , who's aim was to protect everyone involved in the Christian Death Society .The vocals and lyrics for the song ''I Hate You'', off the ''All The Hate'' LP in 1989, were provided by Sevan Kand, who was about five years old at this time, inspired by a fight with a boy twice his age called Jamie who pushed him into a bed of Stinging Nettle s. Also, at this time the band toured with Dutch born drummer Jean-Victor DeBoer and bass player PJ Phillips (from The Nina Hagen Band). The extensive european tour was called ''All The Love...All The Hate'' and finished at London's Astoria Theatre. AFTERMATH Around 1992, Valor recruited bassist/vocalist Maitri (eventually his new wife), and re-established his Christian Death as a rock outfit with the album ''Sexy Death God''. During the late 1980s to mid 1990s, Rozz Williams and Rikk Agnew played some reunion shows with the name Christian Death. Rozz also put out a couple new albums on Cleopatra Records under the Christian Death name with his wife Eva O supplying guitar and back up vocals during the 1990s. One of those albums, ''The Iron Mask'', is interestingly a reference to the Alexandre Dumas novel about an usurper who imprisons the rightful heir to the throne. Valor became enraged at the use of his now trademarked name 'Christian Death'. On 1 April , 1998 , Rozz Williams committed Suicide by hanging. He did not leave a suicide note and it is not known why Rozz would have wanted to take his own life, though it is known that he was struggling with a heroin addiction. Valor immediately seized control over all Christian Death material made by Rozz Williams on Cleopatra records. Valor continues to put out new material under the name Christian Death, though his current incarnation of the group is a lot heavier and has lost a lot of the gothic style for a more metal sound, this is shown on their last album ''Born Again Anti-Christian'' (2000) which features members of black metallers Cradle Of Filth , including vocalist Dani Filth. The new millennium saw Valor's bassist Maitri establish a side project called Lover Of Sin . Though Valor does not perform in this project, he did produce and co-write their self titled debut album released in late 2002. Since the album was released as ''Christian Death Presents Lover of Sin'', the promoters for Lover of Sin's 2003 world tour wrongly billed them as Christian Death. This put fans under the impression that this was yet a new incarnation of the group that not only lacked Rozz and the other original members, but even lacked Valor. SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY With Rozz Williams:
Without Rozz Williams:
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