'Pound'. Music of the 41st Millennium.

[Ovidius Incertus]

Interesting discussion.

 

When I read that particular passage in Eisenhorn I envisioned something like Combichrist.  Some sort of throbbing industrial beat, definitely electronic, but maybe with some weird mut' banging on a 50 gallon drum or something.  The sort of music inspired by slavery in a forge, but not one devoid of technology.

[Lexington]

Everything you just said, in the context of 40k, is like... super heretical.

To whom, precisely?

 

The Ministorum? They think everything outside of their direct purview heretical, sure, but for all the religious zealotry that gets splashed around in 40K's warzones, it seems that the great majority of the Imperium - especially in the parts where you'd find Pound - gives the Church exactly as much deference as they need to in order to get its agents to leave them alone. The Imperial Cult's legal authority and manpower typically aren't nearly enough to keep underground, or even just ground-level subcultures from being and doing exactly the same things they are in the real world.

 

The Mechanicus? Doubtful. They've got a monopoly on the bleeding edge of tech, but basic consumer and industrial electronics have always been portrayed as being manufactured and repaired entirely without Mechanicus interference. Even without any education in the subject whatsoever, people can take apart, understand and hack technology for their own needs. Like William Gibson says, and as NovemberIX showed, the street finds its own uses for things. 

[Withershadow]

Wouldn't it just be like that rave in the Matrix?

[Reyner]

I get the Diva song from Fifth Element in my head for 40k music too.

[Adeptus]

 

Everything you just said, in the context of 40k, is like... super heretical.

To whom, precisely?

 

The Ministorum? They think everything outside of their direct purview heretical, sure, but for all the religious zealotry that gets splashed around in 40K's warzones, it seems that the great majority of the Imperium - especially in the parts where you'd find Pound - gives the Church exactly as much deference as they need to in order to get its agents to leave them alone. The Imperial Cult's legal authority and manpower typically aren't nearly enough to keep underground, or even just ground-level subcultures from being and doing exactly the same things they are in the real world.

 

The Mechanicus? Doubtful. They've got a monopoly on the bleeding edge of tech, but basic consumer and industrial electronics have always been portrayed as being manufactured and repaired entirely without Mechanicus interference. Even without any education in the subject whatsoever, people can take apart, understand and hack technology for their own needs. Like William Gibson says, and as NovemberIX showed, the street finds its own uses for things. 

 

 

To everyone, more or less. We're talking about a religiously fanatical society, utterly devoted to the church, utterly controlled by the Administratum, with people afraid to turn on a generator without invoking the right prayers to the Omnisiah.

 

Now, you're probably right that in some places adherence to the teachings of the church would be token in nature, but there wouldn't be any unbelievers anywhere. This isn't like Europe post reformation, there are no alternate churches or alternate ways to worship* and certainly no tolerance of other religions. There is only one church, and it's reach is impossibly long and it's eyes everywhere. Anyone playing music that WASN'T a devotional hymn would find themselves on the wrong side of the Ecclesiarchy, which is why you'd only find anything resembling a nighclub or any kind of recreational music buried very deep underground. Lower levels of hives, clandestine meetings held by nobles in occult back-rooms, speakeasy style bars away from prying eyes, these are the places you'd find 'pound' music or other purely recreational music.

 

Imagine the nightclub scene in Tehran, but worse, and you're in the right ballpark, IMO.

 

* - I don't want this bit to sound like worship of the Emperor would be the same on all worlds, or even the same allover a single world, it would of course vary from place to place, my point is that if we imagine Europe in say, the 12th Century, we have a fairly good idea of how religion on an Imperial world might look. But even at that time there was tolerance of other religions like Judaism and Islam, so in that regard the Imperium is even grimmer and darker than our own history since any dissenting religious points of view are debated vigorously using fire and the sword, and entire cults and military organisations have grown up around the desire to purge the heretics. There are many ways to worship the Emperor, but there would be very few Imperial citizens who don't believe in his existence and who don't worship in whatever way their local church tells them to.

Edited September 20, 2017 by Adeptus

[kenshin138]

I'm here for the Perturbator. Mostly.

 

I always envisioned Pound music as heavy aggrotech/industrial music. Think early Combichrist. 

[Lexington]

To everyone, more or less. We're talking about a religiously fanatical society, utterly devoted to the church, utterly controlled by the Administratum, with people afraid to turn on a generator without invoking the right prayers to the Omnisiah.

While this is a common idea about the Imperium, I just don't think it really holds up to scrutiny. When you read almost anything at the Imperial "ground level," the Church's influence is mighty, but also remote - it's there, it preaches, but neither the Church nor any other single Imperial organization actually appears to have this all-pervasive, panopticon-level control over the a citizen's life. The Administratum, the Mechanicus and the Ministorum all have a very broad reach, but also a thin one, with very little regular ability to even communicate between worlds, much less enforce top-down edicts. Most everything in 40K is dictated at a local level, and localities - especially in the lower classes - don't seem to be so big on the religious fanaticism.

 

Now, you're probably right that in some places adherence to the teachings of the church would be token in nature, but there wouldn't be any unbelievers anywhere.

Right, but the Imperial faith is, again, very broad. The nature of the Emperor isn't even universally understood. He's a war god, a bringer of the harvest, a protector of the weak, an ever-vigilant divine dictator, whatever works in an individual location. Any given planet may have a hundred or a thousand different schisms and heresies, and billions and billions of citizens who approach their faith in different ways. Heck, even if everyone believes in the Emperor's divine power, you're going to get a lot of people who, due to their situation in life, their age, their personality, whatever, think that the pretentious, overweening jackass can take his divinity and shove it up his throne-hole. Belief isn't worship, and stratified social class systems like those found on a lot of Imperial worlds end up causing huge amounts of de-facto nihilism for those on the bottom. The kind of subcultures that breed Pound music would be almost inevitable.

[Adeptus]

I think it's tempting to look at the 41st millennium through 2nd millennium eyes, and extrapolate our current relationship with religion into the future. If we look at places dominated by religious belief and rule in our history, then the influence of the church is effectively total. Only the most out flung groups of people are without a priest or chaplain to see to their spiritual guidance, there is effectively no such thing as an unbeliever and anyone displaying enough freedom of thought to question the church's teachings is branded a heretic and tortured until they repent.

 

Think 'Spanish Inquisition' and you have an average Wednesday on any Imperial planet.

[NovemberIX]

I hate to keep bringing up the Cain series, but it rather strongly counters that viewpoint. Cain has serched out, found and visited local bars, sometimes with other Imperials, he's insulted and belittled ecclesial figures with no real repercussions to him (which admittedly is probably an outlier)  I'm not trying to change how you prefer to view the Imperium, but I think it needs to be said your espousing a very specific ultra-grim-ultra-dark position, as opposed to my personal favorite, It's-Grim-and-Dark-because-we-haven't-change-since-the-80's.

 

As for extrapolating what M41 is by M2, well, why not extrapolate? It's not like the current age is gonna be remembered the same way we remember early human history (from say the upper paleolithic era) the history of today won't just be found in cave paintings and fossils. We've created media that will reach through the ages, just because a song was recorded a decade ago doesn't mean that same song can't live on for hundreds, if not thousands, of years via slow and steady propagation of the original in whatever format of the day exists as long as one person still holds an interest. So the cultural mores of today could feasibly live on 40,000 thousand years from now because they became a corner stone of whatever entertainment humanity comes up with in the interim.

 

This being all said, it is a big galaxy, there's room for totalitarian and progressive societies.

[Lexington]

Again, tho, I just don't see that being true almost anywhere in depictions of Imperial life. Obviously, that's hard to qualify, to some extent, and the idea of the "average" citizen is a pretty tough one to pin down. Social configurations that define the everyday life of hundreds of billions of people - literally more human beings than have ever been alive on the planet Earth to this day - could still be the tiniest outliers, affecting less than a percent of a percent of a percent of the Imperium's overall population. It's a big place, the galaxy. Lots of room for deviation. At the same time, we just don't see the Ministorum being hyper-repressive, or even massively present across the board, and the basic structure of the Imperium works against that even being possible. There's a lot of religion in Imperial life, obviously, but there's also large spheres that are primarily secular.

[Slave to Darkness]

If theres an anti Islamic Black Metal band in Iraq I am sure people could get away with non conformist music with the 'Prazeeee da Emprahhh' types. 

[Kinstryfe]

Regarding the Imperial Cult and its place in imperial society, I would liken it to modem Christianity in the American Midwest right now *on most planets*. It's the most prevalent societally acceptable religion, has numerous variations in churches and doctrines, and even the next most common religions still worship the God of Abraham. Yet, despite being effectively a socially accepted convention, a great deal of the population don't follow religious doctrine to the strictest letter, aren't controlled directly by the various churches, and paying lip service is socially generally enough without having to adhere to doctrine 100% 24/7. I imagine most places in the Imperium are like this. Everyone worships the Emperor, in whatever ways have become traditional, and if you don't believe you mostly just keep it shut and utter "Praise the Emperor" now and then if you don't want to make a big deal out of it. You show up to the church on Sanguinalia and the Feast of the Emperor's Ascension and spend the rest of the year just trying to survive whatever random factory job you're working. Some worlds/cities/hive spires will of course be under greater control by the Ecclesiarchy, or lesser control, but I'd imagine the most common situation is somewhere in the middle. Figure if you take all our current histories, run them thru another 3-4x the history of Mankind, and multiply real estate and population by a few hundred thousand times, and you're bound to end up with an almost limitless variety of religious dogma, including Cathericism lasting 28,000 more years from present day.

 

Now, how does this apply to the original topic? Well, functionally infinite variation in cultures means that we're left with functionally infinite variation in music, and functionally infinite significance behind the music. Name a style, instrument, or influence and a philosophy and they're bound to exist somewhere in the Imperium. The Cult of a The Emperor's Love practices traditional throat singing, the dual tone representing the presence of The Emperor inside all of us. The Church of the Four-Armed Emperor practices extensive use of bionic secondary arm implants, and play hymns written for twenty fingers on gigantic multi-story organs. The Terran Retrocracy in the lower hives of Carlyle XII rebels against the mainstream electronica driven Imperial Cult by making music only on tiny acoustic guitars, an ancient design dating to the earliest millennia on old Terra. Really, who wouldn't love the aesthetic of traditional priestly figures blaring holy electronica hymns from speakers ten stories tall, while the punk nogoodniks run around rebelling against the system with their ukulele quartets? The options are infinite, and it's a shame we don't see some of the more absurd but eventually guaranteed results explored.

[Adeptus]

Again, tho, I just don't see that being true almost anywhere in depictions of Imperial life.

I think it becomes really hard because we're probably using different sources when it comes to our visions of 'normal' Imperial life, and where we are using common sources it's likely we're interpreting and weighting them very differently!

[Adeptus]

Regarding the Imperial Cult and its place in imperial society, I would liken it to modem Christianity in the American Midwest right now *on most planets*.

I think the problem with that is that the 41st Millennium is most definitely NOT the American Midwest. 

 

One of the reasons religion is in the place it's in today is due to things like the separation of church and state (impossible when the head of state is literally your god, and the Ministorum has a representative in the High Lords of Terra) and improvements to public education and the development of free thinkers during the renaissance, etc etc. 

 

What do we think public education is like in the 41st Millennium? What do we think happens to 'free thinkers' who challenge the notion of the divine right or encourage the separation of church and state?

 

To my mind, a better analogy would be Salem during the witch trials.

Edited September 23, 2017 by Adeptus

[Schlitzaf]

Just an ironic aside the US doesn't have separation, the government simply cannot endorse 1. Furthermore if you promote one religion you have to promote all equally. School Prayer is a case in point, if you do a school prayer, every religion in your destrict needs to be represented equally. So you'll need a hallway of like 10 Holy People.

 

I always imagine Imperium large scale Mega City 1 from Judge Dredd with multiple ecosystems.

[Kinstryfe]

I always envision your average factory world like that as well. Another thing to consider, Necromunda is estimated as having over 100 Billion people on it. Earth now has under 7.5 Billion on it, with a quick Google search avocating for earth presently having over 4000 religions, with 12 major religions or religious groups. When you imagine the amount of manpower, transportation, communication, and other factors required to run a monoreligious planet of 100 Billion people, I think the idea that your average Imperial world is run like the old Inquisition starts to fall apart. Certainly, Cardinal worlds and shrine worlds are likely ran like that, but I'd wager you'd have billions of people living in the underhives, or even the mid-level hab levels that have no knowledge or contact with the Imperial Cult whatsoever. Billions more probably have a passing knowledge that they worship the God-Emperor, but have little to no idea what that even really means. I live in America in the 21st century, with a college degree, having specifically taken one class on comparative religion, and I still have only a passing idea what several of the top 12 most populous regulations on Earth are about, and virtually 0 knowledge beyond name of 3 of them. I'm sure that religious studies aren't that important to many of the hundreds of millions of munitions workers in a given factory complex. That's actually probably a way chaotic or genestealers cults are able to spread, by people just not knowing all the details well enough. Even though there's an official government religion, and adherence is required, I think the scale of the whole thing is what throws it off. I'd wager that even linguistically, unless someone knew Imperial Common (low Gothic?), communication between citizens of 2 different hive spires would be virtually impossible just due to slang and drift in pronunciations. It would be like a Dickensian street urchin trying to communicate with one of Ghengis Khan's Horsemen, or that episode of Star Trek when the walls fell. But that's a whole different essay altogether.

[Adeptus]

I'd imagine that the imperial Cult would totally entrenched in all layers of even a hundred billion hive. Every gang would have a holy man of some sort, even if he wasn't officially endorsed by the Ecclesiarchy. Think about the nature of religion in the middle ages on earth, tie that in with themes of abhorring the witches and mutants and aliens, couple it with the notion of religious tithes and 'donations' and it's easy for me to imagine the average Imperial world as being utterly devoted to whatever their interpretation of the Imperial Cult would be. I would imagine that a city of 100 billion people would see a LOT of wealth flowing into Church coffers every day. Edited September 24, 2017 by Adeptus

[Azekai]

I'd imagine that the imperial Cult would totally entrenched in all layers of even a hundred billion hive. Every gang would have a holy man of some sort, even if he wasn't officially endorsed by the Ecclesiarchy.

Except you don't have that. There isn't a pseudo-priest in every gang, that hasn't been presented as part of Necromundan hive culture and never has been.

 

There are Redemptionist cults, but those crazies are not the standard. I think most underhivers say the occasional prayer when they are in a scrape and that is about the end of it, as there isn't much evidence they closely adhere to the Ecclesiarchy on any level.

Edited September 25, 2017 by Azekai

[Adeptus]

Just because it hasn't been explicitly pointed out doesn't mean it doesn't exist. We're all interpreting this massive patchwork of fiction for ourselves, and we all have our own unique interpretations.

[Claws and Effect]

The Imperium, like any other totalitarian system, relies on snitches to give them the illusion of omniscience.

 

Rumor: "Hey, Drak got busted with heretical musical instruments. The Ecclesiarchy knows everything you do!"

 

Truth: Drak ticked somebody off, who then went and ratted on him for having contraband.

 

The Imperium is far too huge amd has far too many people for it to truly be a total religious state. It has a State Religion, but it is totally impossible to dictate every action of everyone out there.

 

Secular entertainment HAS to exist. And I'm sure the Ecclesiarchy tacitly tolerates it because it keeps people happy, and happy people are easier to lead around by the nose.

[Walter Payton]

I've always thought that "secular" Imperial entertainment would be much like the music that comes out of various dodgy regimes in the present-day.  For example, this extremely heterosexual Russian paratrooper song, and Roki Vulovic's Serbian nationalist soft rock.

[Philip S]

Or Elmo's gonna dance for the motherland. This sounds like 'pound'. Lots of drums, deep base, and pipe banging. And 10 hours of it. Perfect. It needs to be 'de-electronicified', but not far off how I'd imagine it. I think gangers high on drugs could trance out to this, and the drummers would do shifts. If banging on pipes the sound would travel up the hive.

 

Philip