Puerto Muerto, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - LSO St Luke's

Puerto Muerto, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - LSO St Luke's

21 July, 2008
by: John Ellingsworth

I am at the head of the road which I call the Murder Road, telling myself what a mensch I am for not weeping with fear. In front of me, three streetlamps with bulbs of circa 10 or 20 watts cast weak, eerie hazes of light between tracts of intense darkness. I have designated these tracts Killing Zones. At the sides of the road are thick tangles of brush and copses of trees, from which cats and foxes occasionally run, startled by the inventive and determined murderers who lie in wait there. Cobwebs run the breadth of the road. There are drifts of dead, wet leaves.

I do not as a rule like horror films, but the evil sprites at Spoonfed had told me it would be funny, and I thought, Oh, like Shaun of the Dead, or that one with the gigantic crocodile. I had no idea what I was raising my hand for. I did not for instance realise that I would have to listen to a girl scream basically non-stop for fifteen minutes, or that someone gets put live on a meat hook, or that the chainsaw killer wears a mask stitched crudely from the rank, necrotic skin of previous victims he has chased down and killed and sawn to bits. I mean, fuck. I thought he wore a hockey mask.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, augmented with a live soundtrack by St Louisiana duo Puerto Muerto, was screened in St Luke's Church in Old Street as part of the Barbican's Only Connect season. The church is beautiful. I look forward to going back there to watch something that does not harrow me. Four great, matt-silver pillars branch like trees, supporting the roof (with catwalk) and a balcony which runs the sides and back of the hall. There is visible brickwork; airy, scrolling banners roll over the ceiling, pushed slightly out like sails. It is the second best adapted Church I have been in after the Circomedia Church in Bristol, which is rigged for aerial performance.

I suppose I should say something about the music; you know, do a review. Well, the main problem was that there was not enough of it. Stretched over the film, there may have been ten or fifteen minutes. It mostly fit with what was on screen, made it better. There were one or two moments when it overrode dialogue and you were aware that two media were competing, but more often than not it elevated the film, taking the mundane (a man walking through a field) and charging it, playing on the bad fate vibe which gets seeded at the beginning with that grim narration about upcoming horror. Christa Meyer, one half of Puerto Muerto, says the band's sound is "punk rock folk". Maybe. Gothic, corpse-beautiful Americana, about as dark as you would expect. Christa wails clairvoyantly and plays ominous drums and a wee squeezebox. Tim Kelley plays the guitar and banjo (possibly?) and sometimes overlaps Christa with his own wispy voice. Possibly there were more instruments and combos, I don't know. It wasn't possible to look at the band without bringing the screen, and what was happening on the screen, into my peripheral vision. I wanted them to play a set after, but they didn't.

There were a lot of film geeks in that Church, Massacre aficionados, and when afterwards I complained to Christa that the music wasn't a more substantive part of the experience she told me they didn't want to upset the fans. I guess that's admirable, if a little submissive. They originally looked at doing The Wicker Man, but felt it was in the English tradition (the Pagan tradition) and should therefore be tackled by a (Pagan, wicked) English band. Of course I would not want to see that either. So if you are out there, Puerto Muerto, if you are reading, please do a musical overlay for Mulan. It is a grand and heart-warming tale of a young girl who cuts her hair and goes to war. There are some worrying moments, but she does all right and falls in love, and at the end Genghis Khan or whoever falls off a roof or something I think. That is something we could all enjoy.

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John Ellingsworth