INTELLECTUAL SELF-MUTILATION
BALLET MÉCANIQUE
7″
OCTOBER 2006
NAT INC. PRODUCTIONS (002LP)
Intellectual Self-Mutilation is a limited edition gatefold 7” single made in 500 numbered copies. It is the last track recorded by Ballet Mécanique before the band split up in 1982, originally intended to be released as a single at the time. Due to financial hardship it wasn’t, but 24 years later Nat Inc. Productions released it concurrently with Sony-BMG’s 25th anniversary edition of the band’s legendary album The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation.
1. Intellectual Self-Mutilation (3:13)
2. Leathern (Live) (4:52)
INTELLECTUAL SELF-MUTILATION
All their care in me mentioned briefly in a move
Selfish bourgeois as intellectual self-mutilation
Generosity of shared evil
Some denied the possibilities
And the icecold waters spread without intention then
Fattish colourless seemed eternal
Gloriless emotions strangled me
Pulse with mercy gave me light to see
Individual only as a consequence
From bleeding of brotherhood
I seek never seen
I seek never been
Pretentious as soul
Pretentious as honesty
From the journey that killed useless hate
I was born again to share the strength
And for those who try to wash their hands in suffering
I will be there soon but not already
I do not regret what I fought for
Only all the weapons I fought with
I refuse to feel the pain from all my former friends
Those who lived by form and then denied it
Nature
Something has begun to open
Beauty cuts thought
LEATHERN
Edges of speaking, outlived of hatred
Could I forgive at all?
Or could sigh be further than I reached always?
Light died, -ly pregnant
Up, killed in your words
Sheet-minded loving was respect as given thought
Of hairy swine-like
Hours of nameless
Of this penetration
Could I still cry for sad?
Tell friend and leech apart?
The fall of the fallen
Unnamed or misused
Lethal hate given
Word castles built in vain
Salute nugacity
Could I feel guilty?
The leathern tenderness
Did you cry lustful?
I can now nevermore give what I wanted to
To feel so leathern
Cry of the stone tears
Kiss of the unsaid
Without these arms to stretch (died in this early grave)
Like passion for unseen (buried before dying)
I seek the guiltful
To feel so leathern
Emotional
Leprous
Martin Hall: Vocals, piano, bass, cello, guitar, tapes, percussion, balalaika, glockenspiel
Michael Karshøj: Drums, bass
Morten Versner: Bass, violin
Artwork: Martin Hall
Ballet Mécanique’s debut album The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation was originally released in September 1981. The band synthesized rock, avant-garde and poetry in an at the time unheard way, using dancers, slides and films at their concerts to create their own surrealistic ecology on stage. Ballet Mécanique released their second and final album For in 1982 after which singer, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter Martin Hall reconstituted the group as Under For.
When The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation was re-released as a special edition double-cd in relation to its 25th anniversary in September 2006, a bonus disc featured an abundance of previously unreleased material from the period, the biggest scoop being the track ”Intellectual Self-Mutilation”, Ballet Mécanique’s last studio recording ever (the song is recorded at Werner Studio, summer 1982).
Originally the song was planned to be released as a self-financed 7”-single in relation to the split of the group in the autumn of 1982, but the intention was never realized due to the lack of financial means at the time. Up until 2006 the song had never featured anywhere.
Concurrently with Sony-BMG’s re-release of The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation the independent label Nat Inc. Productions issued “Intellectual Self-Mutilation” as a limited edition gatefold 7”-single in 500 numbered copies in collaboration with the goth and industrial club The Black Cat. By this token the original intention with the recording was fulfilled – 24 years after the band split up.
Very surprisingly “Intellectual Self-Mutilation” went straight in as #26 on the official Danish single chart in week 41 (2006) after only one day of sales in the shops. Apart from the title track the B-side features a rare live recording of the track ”Leathern” recorded in Saltlageret during the spring of 1982.