Insight
Lung came out of Vancouver at the start of the 1990s as a power trio, with songs credited to Clark, Taylor and Hanley. Their first record, Psychopornadelia, appeared on Scratch Records in 1991 (SCRATCH 3), a 7-inch single at 33 RPM pressed on red and black marbled vinyl and sold in a polybag with a sticker on the front. 'Mother (Makes Me Feel Like A Man)' took the A-side and the five-minute 'Consume' the B-side. The band co-produced it with Don Gordon, founder of Numb, one of the city's leading electro-industrial bands, and Ken Marshall, who had engineered for Skinny Puppy, recorded it at Mushroom Studios. The release carried a 1991 copyright and phonographic copyright under Illumination, while the run-out grooves set the tone for everything that followed: 'Almost As Good As G.B.H.' on one side and Aleister Crowley's 'Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law' on the other.
The single attracted attention on both sides of the border. In the summer of 1991, Snipehunt described Lung's destructive live performances, with guitars, drums and musicians taking a beating on stage. That October, Maximum Rocknroll praised the band's heavy guitars, ferocious vocals, tape editing and thunderous drumming. Hype criticized the recording quality but acknowledged the tight playing, while Flipside compared Lung's sound to Slug. Vancouver's Georgia Straight heard elements of NoMeansNo's hardcore intensity and Ministry's industrial aggression, and The Rocket singled out Lung as evidence of the strength of Vancouver's heavy underground scene. By spring 1992, Psychopornadelia had appeared at No. 4 on a DJ's favourite 7-inch singles list in RiFLe, the magazine of the University of Kentucky radio station WRFL.
By 1992 Lung had grown to four, with a fourth songwriting surname, Scoular, appearing on the 1992 recordings. On the sleeves the members went by first names only. Mike played bass, credited with low frequency harmonic distortion. Doug supplied guitars and sonic emanations. Richard handled drums, bellows and, by his own account, the manipulation of space and time. Vocals, guitar and "the word" are credited to Jason on the British single and to Max on the album.
On their 1992 releases, Lung built an elaborate mythology around the music. Each came with a missive from Ignatius B. Giles, president of the Illuminated Friends of Lung, a fan club whose members called themselves Lungites. Giles wrote in the voice of a deranged Victorian evangelist, warning the public that Lung was a neural virus, a threat to the Archonic Conspirators and the coming soundtrack of revolution. Prospective Lungites were asked to swear an oath to wreak havoc on multinational corporations, government officials and the local police. Looking back on Psychopornadelia, Giles reported that all hell broke loose.
In 1992 Britain's Serial Killer label issued 'Litany' backed with 'Fuck Generator' (FATAL 02). The B-side was an older song, carrying a 1990 copyright, and it resurfaced on the 1993 Vancouver compilation Wade Free Vancouver. Giles's insert essay recalled first witnessing Lung at a small San Francisco coffee house in the summer of 1991 and staggering away permanently rewired. Again the run-out grooves carried messages: 'Sounds Like He's Building A Shed' on one side and 'Good Deal For The Punters' on the other.
Lung's only album, Magnum Opiate, followed later that year on Zulu Records, on CD (ZULU 8-2) and cassette (ZULU 8-4). The booklet credits an overnight session at Mushroom Studios, from 11 PM to 8 AM on October 2, 1992, again with Don Gordon producing and Ken "Hiwatt" Marshall engineering, and Gerry Hughes credited for "live audio terrorism." The result sat between noise rock and the industrial sound coming out of Vancouver's studios at the time.
The nine tracks include 'Glow,' 'Dive Bomber,' 'Pat Hogue Must Die,' 'Pretty Rabid Dipshit' and 'Superpornoreaction,' closing with a reworking of 'Litany' subtitled 'Absolution Rₓ.' The band handled art direction with the artist Steakface. Giles's liner notes, now datelined from Arkham, Massachusetts, H.P. Lovecraft's fictional town, announced the album as Lung's "first full-fledged evisceration," timed by the I Ching to the fall equinox. The thank-you list ran from Scratch Records and Serial Killer UK to Madonna Louise Ciccone and The Guy That Lent Doug His Guitar.
-Robert Williston
Gallery
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45-Lung - Litany bw Fuck Generator BACK
45-Lung - Litany bw Fuck Generator INSERT SIDE 01
45-Lung - Litany bw Fuck Generator INSERT SIDE 02
45-Lung - Litany bw Fuck Generator VINYL 01
45-Lung - Litany bw Fuck Generator VINYL 02
Litany b/w Fuck Generator
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Credits
Musicians
Jason: guitars, background noise, shit, the word
Doug: guitars, sonic emanations, sub-ethic disturbances
Mike: bass, low frequency harmonic distortions, guttural responses
Richard: drums, bellows, manipulator of time and space
Songwriting
‘Litany’ written by Clark, Taylor, Hanley and Schoulart
‘Fuck Generator’ written by Clark, Taylor, Hanley and Schoulart
Production
Produced by Dan Gordon
Technical
Engineered by Ken ‘Hiwatt’ Marshall at Mushroom Studios, Vancouver, BC
Artwork
Layout and design by Mike
Ass and face by Doug
Release
7-inch vinyl single, 45 RPM, limited edition of 1,500 hand-numbered copies
United Kingdom, 1992
Serial Killer: FATAL 02 (FATAL 2)
Manufactured in England
Distributed in the UK by A.P.T.
℗ 1992 Serial Killer (side A)
℗ 1992 Lung (side B)
© 1992 Lung
Includes printed inserts
Publishing
‘Litany’ © 1992 SOCAN
‘Fuck Generator’ © 1990 SOCAN
Special thanks
Dan, Ken, Keith, Garry, Mitch, Simon, Brother Pete, Kalo, Andrew, Simon Campbell, Charmaine, Scratch Records, Force Four Productions, Peter Hanley, Roberts, Willie Memphis, Jane Pratt, T.R., Joanna and all Lungites everywhere
Special thanks
Dan, Ken, Keith, Garry, Mitch, Simon, Brother Pete, Kalo, Andrew, Simon Campbell, Charmaine, Scratch Records, Force Four Productions, Peter Hanley, Roberts, Willie Memphis, Jane Pratt, T.R., Joanna and all Lungites everywhere
Matrix numbers
Side A: ‘Sounds Like He’s Building A Shed’
Side B: ‘Good Deal For The Punters’
Liner notes
January 21, 1992
I will never forget the moment I first encountered LUNG, or more correctly, a LUNG performance... It was in the summer of ’91, in a small coffee house in San Francisco, the name of which now eludes me. Well no matter, for me it is also unimportant. I say I will never forget, not soon all because some local bizarre ink-toed, or rather indelibly stamped upon my then virgin neural sensorium, whether I wished to be or not. You see, I was not accorded the opportunity to assimilate or synthesize such an experience through short-term memory, as is usually the case. Nay, the aural and visual assault—that is LUNG—quickly incapacitated my sensory networks [specifically, the PNS(or, peripheral nervous system)]—as you too will soon discover, thus, effectively negating any possibility of memory loss. Here, I have found is how it begins.
Some may venture to label the LUNG experience as music?!; well, granted they choose to communicate with crude analog instruments and often combine histrionic performances for the public; however, there is clearly some other spell being cast here, something more insidious, something so insipidly lascivious as to confound the senses. Think of the old good and gentle reader!! It matters not whether one attends a public performance, or experiences LUNG in the privacy of one’s own residence, the end result is always the same(at least I have found). Suffice it to say, that you become irrevocably joined with a cyberactive neural virus in divine synergy.
Now, fear not what you hear, nor approach with great trepidation any subsequent encounters with LUNG (for you know not what you do! Lo, I feel, to bury these misgivings not compound them!) Perhaps you are wondering what effect—if any—the LUNG experience has had on me? Well good reader, after partaking in more than a hundred LUNG experiences, I presently reside as president of the LUNG Fan Club, and I would like to take this moment to cordially invite you to join the ranks of the Illuminated Friends of LUNG or LUNGites as we prefer to be called.
As a matter of fact, if the LUNG experience engenders in you a primal purpose and/or well being, or if you simply get a “Right-On!” or “Hard-In!” (as might well be the case) I should welcome your solemn oath to respond with our humble but ever expanding group.
As a LUNGite, all that is required of you is that you utter this simple credo to the best of your ability:
“I AM A HAPPY MOTHERFUCKER AND I WILL WREAK FUCKING HAVOC ON ALL MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS, ALL GOVERNMENTAL OFFICIALS, AS WELL AS MY LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT COMMUNITY: I REFUSE TO BE A PUPPET OF THE CONSPIRACY, AMEN!”
After all, we have to be a little bit political or what fun would we have?
When I think of what LUNG has done for me, why I’m compelled to guide you, dear reader, along the same pathway towards independence (or did you say “well maybe a little bit”).
Even now, as I write, the cosmic energy is stirring within me/within you... pressing against my skin, swelling in its fortitude craving for ecstatic/chemical release/the groovy 3D sounds of our sonorous nest, and I am not wont to prohibit such an excession (can you see his life?), flutter becomes ecstasy, pulses become vagina’s and consciousness slips IN and OUT of my greasy palm.
Purity and profanity embrace like lost lovers. Ignorance becomes Enlightenment. Oh, insatiable appendage how thou doth beat upon my most FORMIDABLE END!
Mybreathis shortcannotspeakMylips-dryJesus!—Mary, MotherofChrist!...Iwanttoflylikeaneagletothesea!flylikeaneagleletmyspiritcarryme...Comeone Come...leaptoadthePinnacleofDeliverance...THE INDISCRESTASI...IT’S HERE AND IT’S BIG-GER THAN HOUSE FRICTION/PRESSURE LIGHT WHITE LIGHT COLOUR CONSUMING uh, oh! I’m gonna coming...head!
CHILDREN NOW IS THE TIME! JOIN US! but you must decide... YOU CAN’T HOLD IT... SHE’S BREAKING UP... SHE’S BREAKING... SHE’S...
Vancouver, B.C.
Written by Ignatius B. Giles, Vancouver, BC
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