The whole world still holds its head in grief after the horrific Christchurch terrorist attacks that left 50 innocent men, women and children dead at the hands of a neo-Nazi terrorist radicalised by Nazi ideology and Islamophobic propaganda. The. Whole. World.
But not Australia.
Despite being the nation that exported the Christchurch terrorist, Australia remains a safe place for racist and violent bigots, continually demonstrated through our culture wars, in parliament and with a forthcoming tour by Destroyer 666.
An expatriate Australian band now based in Europe, for better or worse Destroyer 666 are iconic.
Whereas most of the bands to emerge from the primordial ooze that would become Australia’s thriving triple j-supported heavy music scene have since added their bones to the pile, Destroyer 666 continues to pull crowds some two-decades into their career.
They’re supported by a dedicated legion of fans, and the band resorting to extreme fear and intimidation tactics when confronted with resistance to their behaviour and politics.
There are many reasons why the forthcoming Destroyer 666 tour of Australia and New Zealand should make you feel sick…
Throughout their decades-spanning career, Destroyer 666 and most notably their vocalist, a grown male who goes by the name K.K. Warslut, have left behind them a slime trail of racist, misogynistic, and violent hate speech.
It’s not harmless, it’s not freedom of speech, and no, Warslut, it’s certainly not “just rock n roll”.
Warslut’s hateful rhetoric is from the same playbook that helped radicalise the Christchurch terrorist: mega-phoned into the ear of disaffected young men in the metal scene, pushing them further from the light and deeper into the world of radical hatred.
The thing is, Destroyer 666 make it sound good, at least to their fans.
Cos, y’know, the riffs, bro?!
In 2012 while opening a show, K.K. Warslut shouted: “This one’s for all the Muslim immigrants that are invading. They’re invited to invade our fucking continents. Fuck you Allah! Yeah everyone’s busy being anti-Christian… fuck being anti-Christian, let’s be fucking anti-Muslim for once!”
Warslut punctuated his Islamophobic rant by Sieg-Heiling with his right hand. If that sounds like too much to be believed, watch the footage for yourself.
Check out Destroyer 666 at the DeathKult Open Air Festival:
A thunderous applause from their fans followed.
In 2016, after music journalist and photographer Blair Hopkins mentioned being inappropriately groped by a fan at a Destroyer 666 show in New York she reviewed, K.K. Warslut took to Facebook (in a since-deleted but widely reported post) to write: “Clearly your [sic] insecure about your looks woman and felt a burning desire to advertise just how irresistible you are. To drunks. Sad desperate bitch” and labels Hopkins a “little lying dishonest whore [sic].”
In Hopkins’ review, which remains online and is largely positive towards the band, she also documented ‘stage banter’ from K.K. Warslut that included asking the audience to ensure there were “NO FAGGOTS?” in attendance and responding with “That’s the attitude we need tonight” when another audience member shouted “We need more white women in here!”
During a concert in 2018, K.K. Warslut referred to #MeToo activists as a bunch of “Cunts” who need a “hard dick”. His room full of devoted fans met these words with approval.
This came after the #KillTheKing movement, a #MeToo offshoot operating within the metal world that specifically singled out K.K. Warslut for his history of misogynistic and sexist harassment of women in the metal scene.
At a previous concert at Metal Magic Festival in Denmark, K.K. Warslut began their set with a sexist rant to the effect of “You guys are a bunch of wankers. You live in a matriarchal culture. I get nauseous from you guys.”
At a metal festival in Sweden last weekend, Destroyer 666 called the women of the Swedish metal scene’s #MeToo movement, #killthekings, a bunch of “cunts” and said they need a “hard dick.” Charming. https://t.co/JHjcf5ypfo
— Kim Kelly (@GrimKim) January 12, 2018
Later he added:
– This song is dedicated to the cunts in #killtheking.
One of the initiators of #killtheking – Emelie Draper – said this: (2/4)
— Niklas Pivic (@pivic) January 9, 2018
There’s plenty more examples, but we get it. K.K. Warslut and Destroyer 666 use their stage time to spread messages of hate, and their offstage time to circle their wagons, and encourage fans to threaten writers, editors, and reviewers.
It seems that one of the main reasons you can’t read a play-by-play of Destroyer 666’s racist douchebaggery over the years may be because of the threats of physical violence by the band’s fans towards editors, prompting many to unpublish their content.
This is understandable given the physical consequences of white supremacist hate speech: incitements to real world violence, including deadly terrorist attacks like in Christchurch.
Metal Sucks was one such publication in the past who understandably put the safety of their staff first after Warslut, who hid behind the safety of a fake name and a loyal fans, directed fans to attack the publication after they covered some of his “stage banter”.
Destroyer 666’s behaviour and beliefs are even more disturbing when the ideology that may partly inform K.K. Warslut’s racist, sexist and violent “stage banter” is examined more deeply.
Warslut has prominently displayed a Wolfsangel tattoo on his stomach – an ancient Germanic rune adopted as the insignia of several Waffen-SS units, and the official symbol of the US-based Neo-nazi terrorist group Aryan Nations.
Rather than trying to ‘reclaim’ the Wolfsangel rune from the Nazis who perverted its meaning, K.K. Warslut seems more eager than anything to lean into it.
K.K. Warslut has a long relationship with NSBM (National Socialist Black Metal) and RAC (Rock Against Communism) bands (Both defined by slackbastard in his detailed documentation of the far-right in music; an eye-opening read in which our friend KK appears multiple times.)
Before fans decry this as simply “bigotry by association” (an inadequate defence at best), let’s look at an interview K.K. Warslut gave a Melbourne radio station following the release of their album Unchain The Wolves.
After referring to Norwegian black metal musicians as “skinny faggots,” Warslut described the white wolf motif as representing “the spirit of the white man.”
Check out Destroyer 666’s Melbourne radio interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pfjaL-7IPU&feature=youtu.be
Just over a month ago, 50 innocent people were gunned down by a neo-Nazi terrorist in Christchurch while they prayed. Next month, Destroyer 666, a band who seem to share the terrorists ideology, are set to tour Australia.
Hate speech and incitement to violence should not be a profitable venture on our shores.
We need to ask their promoter Soundworks Touring, what margin of ticket sales from white supremacists is acceptable to them.
We need to ask the Australian venues hosting this tour (Factory Theatre in Sydney, the Wooly Mammoth in Brisbane and Max Watt’s in Melbourne) how many drink sales make it worthwhile to platform an Islamophobic rant on their stages.
Some Destroyer 666 fans may have remained apolitical, but now need to reflect what side they are really on — because the music scene can no longer pretend there is a neutral ground.
The delusion of neutral ground was erased when 50 people were murdered by an Australian neo-Nazi in two mosques in Christchurch.
We all have a social role to play in combating hate speech and violence and working to prevent terrorism. Let’s make sure our music scenes in no way profit from or promote white supremacy, or play a role in radicalising yet another white supremacist terrorist.
Let’s not leave it solely to a 16-year-old with an egg to stand up for us as a nation this time.
