Download

ohGr

Tracing Ogre’s trajectory

By MATT PARISH | December 5, 2008

Skinny Puppy's Nivek Ogre has made the rounds for the better part of this decade as ohGr, with a more cut-and-paste approach to the electric misanthropy his old band pioneered. The project's third album, Devils in My Details (SPV), crawled out of its dank hole last month, and the group are hitting the Paradise this Saturday. Industrial pop metal has woven a crooked path through the goth underground and White Zombie schlock rock to its apparent final resting place in video games and horror-movie soundtracks. We'll take a sec here and trace Ogre's trajectory in the whole thing.

ohGr, “Feelin’ Chicken”
This track from Devils in My Details shows a playful side of Ogre, taking a hobbled Casiotone waltz and gathering a bunch of misfit synths and sound effects as well. "You're killing me with bacon, America!" begins the long, tricky rant. It's like a sinister Allen Ginsberg fronting Negativland.

Skinny Puppy, “Dig It”
Rewind to '86 and Skinny Puppy's influential first single's bizarre appropriation of bit-crushed guitars and what sounds like Run-DMC's busted TR-808. Ogre rasps "execute economic slave" while glassy synths cascade like shovels at a spooky graveyard — which happens to be where the video for this song takes place. Trent Reznor has openly admitted to ripping this off when he wrote "Down in It."

Ministry, “The Fall”
Skinny Puppy's direct æsthetic hand-me-down, Al Jourgensen was nearly in Ogre's post–Skinny Puppy project W.E.L.T., till they ran into contract troubles and had their name snatched up by a SoCal punk band. Ogre went on to form ohGr without Jourgensen, and the only W.E.L.T. song that ever surfaced, "Noreen," got chopped up and tossed into this epic downer from Ministry's Filth Pig in 1996.

Skinny Puppy, “Ugli”
Meanwhile, Skinny Puppy reunited for the gloomy Doomsday Festival in Dresden in 2000, and they've since released three records. This song, from 2007's Mythmaker (it eventually landed on the Saw V soundtrack), blends dusty techno IDM bass bombs and squiggly samples with scratchy metal guitars and the slogan "Jesus wants to be ugly."

Topics: Download , Al Jourgensen, Allen Ginsberg, Electronic Music, More

Comments

Add a Comment

Today's Event Picks

[MUSIC] Books

Plus 7 more >>

ARTICLES BY MATT PARISH

ALT- TOGETHER NOW | April 08, 2009
Sarah Borges leaps ahead by getting back to basics

HOT BOX EXPERIMENT ON THEMSELVES | March 23, 2009
Lab Rats

GRAND DESIGNS | March 12, 2009
Taxpayer do some sound planning

HEAVY FLOW | March 05, 2009
Doomstar! let it all come naturally

ME TIME | February 25, 2009
Animal Hospital has achieved a hermetic place in the city’s musical landscape.

See all articles by: MATT PARISH

Most Viewed

Most Emailed

KINKY BOSTON
A small audience settles in to a few rows of plastic chairs to watch a woman named Bunny get spanked — but not as voyeurs. They're students. And this is Sadomasochism 101.

ALL QUIET ON THE TIMES CO. FRONT
When I heard this past Friday that the New York Times Company had delivered a radical ultimatum to the Boston Globe 's 13 unions I called Globe spokesman Bob Powers to check it out. He wasn't talking.

LAWMAKERS TO PROBE PRISON
For years controversy has churned over the Maine State Prison's treatment of both inmates and correctional officers. For the first time, legislators have taken action.

FABULOUS FAKES
The e-mail from "Craig Cook" arrived on March 2. It directed me to a Facebook page pretending to be Greg Cook's, and a YouTube video. I was busy, so I watched only the beginning of the latter.

VIDEO SLIDESHOW: SEXUAL FETISHES
From pony play to puppy play

LAWMAKERS TO PROBE PRISON
For years controversy has churned over the Maine State Prison's treatment of both inmates and correctional officers. For the first time, legislators have taken action.

KINKY BOSTON
A small audience settles in to a few rows of plastic chairs to watch a woman named Bunny get spanked — but not as voyeurs. They're students. And this is Sadomasochism 101.

INTERVIEW: RICKY JAY
"There are people who react strangely. I've had people who will clutch rosary beads or throw glasses."

LOVED THESE BUT NOT THOSE
Of the great international orchestras, perhaps the one that's most unfairly overlooked is the London Symphony Orchestra. Yet a handful of the very greatest orchestral performances I've ever heard have been with the LSO.