Alien Sex Fiend - Biography
ALIEN SEX FIEND - BIOGRAPHY Darwin would have been proud of Alien Sex Fiend, a highly successful musical organism that has resisted 24 years' worth of attempts at pigeonholing and issued 13 barrier-breaking studio albums in the process. Continually cited for this brazen shedding of norms, the beautifully bizarre duo of Nik Fiend and Mrs. Fiend - aided by an ever-shifting squad of henchmen - have yet to stand still in any zone of space and time. What is new in Fiendland? Something has
been brewing in the fiendish caustic cauldron,
and new compilation sampler CD "Para-Abnormal"
is IT. Forging forward from where Anagram Records' retrospective "The
Best Of Alien Sex Fiend" collection concludes, the 2006 release
of "Para-Abnormal" celebrates the terrorific
ten year anniversary of the band's own 13th
Like H.R. Giger's facehugger-to-adult Alien metamorphosis in that fabled film, Alien Sex Fiend '06 aren't a different band than say, the '97 incarnation, or the Fiends of '94 or '84. They are simply a more advanced form of the very same, very special beastie, genetically modified for the times.
Alien Sex Fiend brought attention to the notorious Batcave
club in London and its subsequent scene, though the band soon progressed
beyond the genre's boundaries. This formative period was later documented
on "The Legendary Batcave Tapes" album.
Their classic 1983 debut single, the Youth
(Killing Joke)-produced "Ignore The Machine"
and its accompanying album, "Who's Been Sleeping
In My Brain?", captured the Fiends initial burst of psychotic
energy. Riveting lysergic follow up "Acid Bath"
moved further into strange and spine tingling song structures, and led
into the bleaker, more brooding interludes of 1985's "Maximum
Security." With 1986 experimental monsterpiece "It
-The Album," Alien Sex Fiend scaled unearthly peaks of creativity
and/or insanity, followed by a pair of 1987 gems - "The
Impossible Mission Mini LP" and the hallucinogenic "Here
Cum Germs" album - and era-defining singles compilation "All
Our Yesterdays". In an atomic renaissance of Fiendish style, 1988's
"Another Planet" charted a new course
of luscious lunacy, merrily continued on 1990's chaotic "Curse"
and 1992's mysterioso menagerie "Open
Head Surgery." Throughout this eerie ouvre, Alien Sex Fiend built a fanatical following for their enthrallingly garish gigs, enticing the likes of Iggy Pop and David Bowie into fervent Fiend fandom, and opening for Alice Cooper on his Nightmare Returns jaunt. Live, the ASF experience is a creature-feature cabaret with Munsterian magician Nik as ringleader, armed with his array of lethal props, and surrounded by utterly gonzo self-designed stage sets. Their tyrannical tours have been documented on four merciless live albums to date: "Liquid Head In Tokyo" (1985), epic double set "Too Much Acid?" (1989), "The Altered States Of America" (1993), and the latest, wildest "Flashbacks! (Live 1995-98)" (2001). Not limited to aural adventures, Alien Sex Fiend have left no form of
media untouched. Nik Fiend has shown his sardonic
Dali-esque paintings and artwork - featured
on each and every ASF album - to great acclaim at art exhibitions around
the globe (see Gallery). Videowise,
Alien Sex Fiend were championed by MTV's callow creeps 1994 found Alien Sex Fiend venturing where
no group had gone before when they became the first band in the history
of our solar system to compose and record an entire CD-ROM
computer game soundtrack for the hot sci-fi game "Inferno
- The Odyssey Continues". Although it served a functional gaming
purpose, the "Inferno" score also stood on its own as an album
- an irresistible mix of man and machine, fiend and
fun. Anagram Records compilation "The
Singles 1983-1995" neatly encapsulated the band's first dozen
years' worth of musical mayhem by including every sordidly superb single
to date. The birth of Alien Sex Fiend's own 13th Moon Records in 1996 and the subsequent release of the "Evolution" singles marked the dawning of their next insane reign. Unshackled from any and all artificial boundaries, 13th Moon enabled the gruesome twosome to more efficiently pursue their surreal and humorously deviant vision with total and complete independence. Surprise remained an ASF hallmark, and 1997 studio album "Nocturnal Emissions" (the re-issue "Nocturnal Emissions (Special Edition)" followed in 2000), was no exception. Their most futuristic effort, yet quintessentially Fiendish, it flowed and feinted with a seamless sense of cool. From the introductory groundbreaking single "Evolution" and beyond it was obvious that the Fiends space race was far from over, a point hammered home by the ensuing "On A Mission" and "Tarot Mixes" (1998) 12" singles, and an audacious DJing stint as "Fiend At The Controls". This led ASF to extensively re-examine some of the cobwebbed ghosts lurking within their archives, resulting in the 1999 2-CD monsterwork "Fiend At The Controls Volume 1 & 2" for Anagram Records.
Which brings us back to the present. Still mutating faster than the normal brain can comprehend with their mega-musical tentacles reaching into uncharted lands of sight, sound, and sanity, Nik and Mrs Fiend remain a nefarious nucleus able to attract the finest in contributing satellites for their ravishing reverberations. "Para-Abnormal" is only the latest launch pad for this band's ongoing exploration of new sonic terrain. With the whispered potential of a new studio album we are sure to find this fungal fantasia of a group once again refusing to stand stock still. Where exactly they will take you, the listener, only the Fiendish ones know. Evolve or die is firmly entrenched as mantra of choice in this strange new murderous millennium. With minds expanded and samplers blazing, Alien Sex Fiend show no signs of extinction. With thanks to Greg Fasolino |