8. Last House On The Left
It was banned in England for a hell of a long time. The final – fully uncut – version didn’t come out until about 2007. It was planned to be the most horrible movie ever made. The original title was ‘Sex Crime of the Century’. It was like they were saying ‘what can we do – what can we say – to make this the most horrible movie ever made’. There are quite a few levels that the movie works on, for me. The main protagonists are this weird gang; there’s one girl in the gang. A few times I’ve thought ‘this is Electric Wizard’ (laughs). There is the whole Blood Lust fantasy – supposedly the darkest and most depraved band ever – and they’re playing in New York. And it’s meant to be like early Alice Cooper mixed with Black Sabbath. And the other strange thing about it is that the music is essentially the exact opposite of what is going on screen. They have this hippie thing going on: hippie music playing as people are getting murdered. It sets the vibe perfectly. The Woodstock vibe gone sour, the fact that there are always going to be people ready to shit on whatever hippie vibe is set up.
It’s funny, you know. Sometimes I wonder what happened to rock music? I used to go down to gigs to score weed or score acid. Someone would be selling it. What the fuck has happened? The hedonism was all part of it and it’s gone, largely. You were there to get fucking out of it and have a good time. It seems like other music forms have taken that vibe. If Coldplay are representing rock music we’re just fucked, aren’t we? We’re here to have a good time and get fucked. And sometimes getting into the music is about getting bollocksed. Obviously that can be hard if you’ve got a normal life and a normal job. But I want to experience it properly.
