:: Dead Inside The Chrysalis album launch - Annandale Hotel, Sydney - January 2008

By: Alexandra Coghlan

Described variously as ‘a futurist-cult visionary act’, a ‘high-concept, designer-wave, cyberpunk entertainment system’, and as ‘cyber-punk, pop, glam, new rave and electro-trash rock’, it becomes evident that Australian band Dead Inside The Chrysalis defy any standard musical or aesthetic categorisation. Their unconventional approach centres on a philosophy of creating their own parallel reality, communicated in ‘dreadwaves’ that channel data from Earth’s twin-planet ‘Oblivion’, and extends even to their supporters, who are considered not fans but active ‘users’ of their music and exist collectively as ‘The Mutant Generation’.

So far, so far-out.

Armed with this information it was thus with no little curiosity that I made my way to alternative Sydney music venue the Annandale Hotel recently for the launch of the band’s fifth album, Who Killed Entertainment?, to see exactly what it was all about.

The almost impossible job of opening for a band as vehemently anti-establishment as Dead Inside The Chrysalis fell to Australian 3-piece group Acid Eyeliner, who, rather than fulfilling the conventional opening-act Amazon-recommendations-role of ‘If you like this you may also like…’, instead provided a point of musical contrast and departure for the main act, conveniently embodying everything that would be so aggressively rejected later in the evening. Conventionality notwithstanding, the group performed a slick and energetic set, engaging the crowd with a mix of punchy punk-rock anthems (including crowd-favourite ‘Scream Your Name’) and gentler rock ballads, which as ever in a smaller venue with fewer people to generate atmosphere, proved harder to pull off. Nevertheless, with some brave moments of unadorned purely acoustic music-making that showcased the secure vocal skills of Lukey Lukess, and some epic guitar and drumkit breaks, the group successfully commanded audience attention and enthusiasm before relinquishing the stage to the evening’s main act.

Enter Dead Inside The Chrysalis, sporting an unlikely set of hooded chenille robes, and pacing moodily about to playback like so-many zombies in a boxing ring, before throwing off these outer-garments (symbolism, anyone?) and giving voice. As grand entrances go it lacked perhaps the gravitas I was expecting from these futuristic philosophers, but I remained hopeful that it suggested a streak of irony in proceedings, which had hitherto been sorely lacking. In retrospect I feel that this may have been wishful thinking.

The set was short, consisting of the four new tracks that feature on Who Killed Entertainment?, alongside various demos and remixes of earlier songs. The album’s title track, repeated at the start and end, was a rhythmically pulsing wash of white noise, through which only the eerie vocal bendings of lead singer Manek Deboto and kitsch electro-organ progressions of Drad Xerox were discernible. Female ‘vocalist’ Nuke Puke’em’s major contribution to proceedings - clearly every credible alternative punk band needs a token heroin-chic floozy with green hair - appeared to be holding up a series of signs to the crowd while shouting and gyrating wildly around the stage. Balance issues plagued the performance, obliterating almost entirely not only the female vocals but also the lyrics. Troubling also was the comparatively small quantity of music-making actually taking place on the stage, with a disproportionate quantity of pre-recorded musical elements further weakening the impact of the ‘live’ performance.

Bereft of any real musical frame of reference for the aggressively non-melodic barely harmonic barrage of sound, I found myself necessarily focusing on the group’s stage presence, and what surprised me most was the lack of charisma or electricity emanating from the stage. Plenty of energy was expended in the ADD gyrations and air-punching of ‘mutant pinup grrl’ Nuke-Puke‘em and Manek Deboto’s constant pacings, but any real communication seemed to die at the stage’s edge, long before reaching the audience.

As an album, Who Killed Entertainment’s appeal seems primarily directed at die-hard fans, sorry ‘users’, who will relish the opportunities it offers to possess out-of-print tracks and curiosities. For those not as yet initiated into the Mutant Generation I wouldn’t recommend dashing out to join, unless you genuinely believe that pseudo-philosophical pomposity is justification enough for such complacently second-rate music, music that renders ‘Dead Inside The Chrysalis’ more description that mere name. As to the evening’s central question, Who Killed Entertainment? The answer seems all-too evident….