Terror hits close to home for Biohazard

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/11/2001 (8941 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THE way American pop stars go on about the events of Sept. 11, it’s easy to forget most of them were thousands of kilometres from New York City when the World Trade Center was obliterated.

Not the guys in Biohazard. The deathly serious heavy rock band lives within fallout distance of Ground Zero, right across New York’s East River in Brooklyn.

The morning of the terrorist attack, guitarist Billy Graziadei poked his head outside his apartment and found little bits of burning paper floating through the air — airborne particles from the collapse of the first of the two towers.

“My whole neighbourhood was covered in dust and smoke. It was horrific. We couldn’t believe it,” says Graziadei, who plays the Royal Albert Arms tonight as Biohazard visits Winnipeg for the first time in its 11-year career.

“Our studio’s just a stone’s throw from what used to be the World Trade Center. Now you spend your time looking at the skyline going, ‘Where was it again?’ ”

As fate would have it, Sept. 11 was also the date Biohazard’s seventh album, Uncivilization, arrived in record stores. The title track includes references to “systematic murder,” “population control” and a “deadly global war” — eerie and unwelcome coincidences for a band that’s been writing bleak, sometimes apocalyptic songs for more than a decade.

“I wanna blow up The White House and the shopping malls with our army of four,” shouts frontman Evan Seinfeld during another new song called Unified. In an instant, Biohazard’s anti-authoritarian lyrics seemed horribly out of step with the times.

Not that many people noticed, however. Unlike Oakland rap group The Coup — whose new (and since-pulled) CD cover art depicted the World Trade Center exploding in flames — Biohazard didn’t take any flak for Uncivilization.

In part, that’s because the Brooklynites’ lyrics are so obviously metaphorical. Even Tipper Gore wouldn’t be so stupid as to accuse these guys of inciting violence.

On the other hand, the lack of attention was typical of the group’s career: Biohazard’s role as one of the first rock bands to bridge the gap between hard-core punk and heavy metal is often overlooked.

Beginning with the self-titled Biohazard album in 1990, the quartet built up a cult following with very heavy music that at first seemed preoccupied with street violence, class warfare and . . . well, more street violence. Eventually, social commentary began to displace songs about the street as the band members found more eloquent ways to deal with their unhappy childhoods.

With Uncivilization, Biohazard’s grim vision is brightened up to a mere scowl, as the group makes fun of corporate rock stars (presumably Limp Bizkit and Kid Rock, though names are left unsaid) for pretending to be tough and seems to berate commercial punk bands during the songs Plastic and Sellout, respectively.

Despite those sentiments, Graziadei has no regrets about Biohazard’s lot in life.

“We’ve reached a lot of people in a very painful world. That means more to me than a cover of a magazine, a video on MTV or a gold record on the wall.”

Biohazard plays the Royal Albert Arms tonight with Clutch and Candiria. Tickets are $25 at Into The Music, Music Baron Downtown and Ticketmaster, 780-3333.