Fear is spreading like a virus
Added to the sum
In the distance theres an engine
It slowly starts to hum
Sweden’s Bo Magnusson first carved his name into Sweden’s underground with the industrial mayhem of Dr. Evil and The Boys From Below. Rising in the ’80s and early ’90s, their chaotic performances—pig skulls, towering test tubes, and levitating washing machines—blurred the line between music and performance art, stirring awe and unease in equal measure. By 1992, the group dissolved, and Magnusson vanished from the music world, his creative fire seemingly dimmed.
Reigniting in 2015, Magnusson unveiled The Below, a project steeped in his experimental origins yet daringly different. Scavenging forgotten instruments and repurposed relics, he shapes a raw, metallic cacophony where post-punk collides with industrial grind. The Below transforms noise into something visceral, carving bold new paths from the remnants of sound’s past.
Tabla Motors confronts the slow crawl of age and the looming specter of death with a raw honesty that pierces the veil of comfort. Its lyrics sketch a world teetering on the edge, where the sacred crumbles and the revered gods lie abandoned, their temples dissolving into ash. Darkness seeps through every line, erasing memories and igniting panic. In the wake of their ruin, new creeds sprout like weeds, promising fleeting solace to weary souls grasping for meaning in the storm of chaos. The final silence settles like ash, heavy with the echoes of anguish and the relentless churn of a force that refuses to yield. The simple, almost ancient-sounding melody grips with taut beauty, a reflection of life’s fleeting passage and the restless shifting of belief and existence.
Mike Coles crafts a hypnotic visual odyssey for Tabla Motors, splicing found footage with jagged, modern animation to create a fractured, poetic vision of time unraveling. The result is a fever dream—a stark and startling portrayal of humanity on the precipice, where each frame trembles with the weight of a world nearing collapse. Will we ever learn our karmic lessons?
“Killing Joke is one of the most influential bands ever, and I have always loved their graphic profile,” says Magnusson. ‘To be able to work with Mike Coles, who has done a lot of their artwork and videos, is a true honour.”
Watch the video for “Tabla Motors” below:
The Below follows the acclaim of this summer’s Immutable Decay with a new five-track EP, Behaviour in Public Places, a collection that dives even deeper into dissonance and despair. While Immutable Decay struck with its metallic percussion and unrelenting industrial clamor, its collaborations with Aaron Sutcliffe brought an anguished humanity to its stark exploration of environmental collapse and existential unease.
This time, Jesper Hanning steps into the fold, lending a fresh urgency to Behaviour in Public Places. The EP veers into more experimental territory, its sound rawer and more unsettling. With this release, The Below delves into its darkest recesses yet, a blistering confrontation with the uncanny.
Pre-save the Behaviour in Public Places EP, due 22 November, here.
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