Death In June – Rose Clouds Of Holocaust (1995)

April 22, 2022

I’m going to have to address Douglas P’s politics at some point. Probably in the form of a YouTube video so nothing is lost through hard text. That is an unfortunate reality I am faced with have now covered several Death In June records here. I love Death In June. There is no other band that sounds quite like them, despite them being a highly imitated pillar of the neo folk movement.

In the early days I dismissed their “fash” vibe as shock value, a band playing with the power of symbols (their whiphand logo being far more powerful than the tired, overused SS skull), which later devolved into edgelord bullshit. Once I saw DIJ merch that had the totenkopf superimposed onto the rainbow pride flag, I thought I’d seen all I needed to know about where the band actually stood.

And then you get to records like this. Truly it is a beautiful album. A stunning composition. Another baiting title, but otherwise a wonderful album and listening experience. Until, you get to the title track itself, and you hear the chorus: “rose clouds of holocaust, rose clouds of lies”. And instantly I’m back at square one going, err, hang on a second here.

I don’t know where I’m going with this. But I feel a longer piece coming, where I will attempt to address this shit properly.