There’s always been an air of mystery around Vegas. What's up with the band name? Who's in the band? "The mystery is the beholder’s eye, and more often than not, but another way of ignorance, at the heart of creativity and familiarity, can be fertile ground for contempt," says T, the mastermind behind Vegas, definitely keeping that enigmatic spirit alive in his response. "Do not advocate, do not deny — live with it. It is all about perspective. At the end of the day we are all in gutter gazing at the stars. These days the true mystery is the visible, not the invisible.
With its earliest recordings surfacing in the early '00s, Vegas has released material through such fine labels as A389 Recordings, Organized Crime Records, and Judas Chair Collective. Speaking of the latter, they'll soon be releasing issuing Digital Affairs Neurotic, the latest album from Vegas, as a collaboration with The Final Judgment Records from Poland. The cover art was designed by Give Up, an artist (artists?) who is perfectly aligned with the Vegas visual aesthetic.
Listen to the raw and hellish sounds of "Gift of Oblivion" below to get a quick taste of what is in store for you on Digital Affairs Neurotic. T sounds like he's screaming from a sewer while Lip Cream are jamming on a filthy street above him.
I ask T about Vegas' sonic blueprint, and the artists that helped inform the writing during the band's earliest days. "A melange of Paul Young, Negative Approach, Depeche Mode, Cheetah Chrome Motherfuckers, Infest, GISM, Life’s Blood, Hammerhead B.T., Born Against, Acme, and Integrity," he tells me, and man, what a festival lineup that would be!
With Digital Affairs Neurotic arriving in early March, T tells me he's proud to be affiliated with the Judas Chair Collective. "At face value, Judas Chair Collective might be known as a conglomerate of great characters from the North of Europe who are dedicated about their bands, labels and other endeavours, and whose releases are labours of love, with a lot of attention being paid to detail. It was not until I visited Helsinki that I discovered the sinister core of the operation, for which the label and bands only seem to be a front for something that runs much deeper than their bands and label would suggest. The protagonists behind JCC are tiejätät to the core and while I was intrigued by how Väinämöinen serves as an identity model for their collective when I was invited to one of their Sahti rituals."
Pre-orders of Digital Affairs Neurotic are available from Judas Chair Collective and Final Judgement Records.
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