103
Prompt: (300-375 words)
Using only the (Marshall ) compare and contrast the two photographs in terms of:
Formal Elements:
1.Make sure to specify which photographs you have chosen
2.Composition (arrangement of people, objects, background) and poses of the people
Context behind the death metal music scene and La SAPE:
3.Origins: What are the origins of the cowboy aesthetic in the death metal music scene? What are the origins of La SAPE
4.Fashion: What are the people in the photographs wearing? How do their clothing and accessories reflect the subcultures of the death metal music and La SAPE?
5.Music: What is the death metal cowboys’ relationship to music? What is La SAPE’s relationship to music?
Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University
Visions of Renegades
Author(s): Frank Marshall
Source: Transition , No. 109, Persona (2012), pp. 63-71
Published by: Indiana University Press on behalf of the Hutchins Center for African and
African American Research at Harvard University
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/transition.109.63
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Transition
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https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/transition.109.63
Ghost. Black and white photograph. © 2010 Frank Marshall. Courtesy of the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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Marshall • Visions of Renegades 63
Visions of Renegades
Transition speaks with photographer Frank Marshall about heavy metal
in Botswana
Frank Marshall: My parents listened to bands like Black Sabbath and
Iron Butterfly when they were young. But they never listened to it full on.
My older sister got me into Metallica, Guns N Roses, Nirvana, and Def
Leppard when I was around ten years old. Then as I entered my teens I
really got into it and started buying the records for myself. I discovered the
metal community in Botswana by chance when I was traveling in Botswana
with a South African metal band. They had been invited to play a show in
Bots alongside local bands.
TRANSITION: Can you describe the scene at a metal show?
Marshall: Rockers in Botswana wear cowboy boots and hats. You can
buy them at Cut Price, a shop in Gaborone. It’s the most expensive shop
for rockers and sells exclusively metal paraphernalia. Here you find every-
thing from Motorhead patches to Guns N Roses flags, which fans sometimes
wear as capes. Iron Maiden and Cannibal Corpse shirts are the most
common band t-shirts you see. Many of the local bands also produce their
own t-shirts, which are also a common sight at concerts.
There are quite a few of rockers who buy leathers and modify them with
studs and interesting add-ons. They keep them for themselves, or they will
often sell or trade them among one another. A couple of the rockers work as
rangers for local games reserves, so they pick up things in the bush and assimi-
late them. It isn’t uncommon to see them wearing baboon skulls on chains
around their necks or carrying animal horns, which they drink beer from.
Some of the fans are steel workers, who craft unique looking staffs or
walking sticks. I’ve seen a couple guys carrying shovels and steel pipes with
them to gigs. They use these as symbolic items, not for hurting anyone.
The fans usually muster outside the venues before the shows start. Then
you see guys show up on their motorcycles. One thing they do is travel in
convoy with military precision. If you’re lucky you can see a whole group of
fans marching in single file toward the venue. You hear them before you see
them. Sometimes you hear an awkward silence followed by cheers and shouts
by onlookers in the street. Their presence just overpowers everything.
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64 Transition 109
TRANSITION: Who attends metal shows? What are the demographics?
Marshall: They are mostly modest, working-class folk. They come from
all over Botswana and many of them travel from far and wide to attend
shows—often as much as 500 km from small villages and remote areas. It
doesn’t faze them at all. They sometimes pool their money together to hire
a minibus to drive to a show.
Most of the people at shows are devout fans, but I’ve recently heard
reports that an increasing number of ‘regular people’ have been turning up
at shows to see what it’s all about. I’d say that for every ten men, there are
around two to three women. But I think the number of women is increasing
quite rapidly. Most of the audience is in their twenties and thirties, but there
are some much older ones like ‘Poison The Legend’ or ‘Old Gun.’
TRANSITION: How do rockers greet each other? Are there any special
handshakes?
Drag the
Waters (Metal).
Black and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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Marshall • Visions of Renegades 65
Marshall: You often see two friends greet one another with a kind of
showdown cowboy jig where they circle each other and perform martial
arts moves. Chuck Norris, with Walker Texas Ranger, made a mark. They
like to demonstrate their combat prowess in a playful display, like brothers
who roughhouse. Guys like Gunsmoke are kung fu practitioners. He has
represented Botswana in national martial arts competitions.
TRANSITION: What are the day jobs of the rockers in these photos?
Marshall: Gunsmoke is a museum curator. Hardcore is a prison warden.
Quite a few work for the government, like Joster. Generally speaking, the
guys from Jwaneng are usually employed at the large diamond mines there;
in Maun, at the Okavongo Delta, many of them are employed in the tourist
industry on the delta. Phantom Lord Ishmael is a soldier in the Botswana
army.
TRANSITION: Who is the most famous metal performer in Botswana?
Venerated
Villain
(Kenosi). Black
and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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66 Transition 109
Marshall: It is, of course, subjective. I’d have to put it between Stux
Daemon of Wrust and Giuseppe Sbrana of Skinflint.
TRANSITION: How is metal in Botswana different from the metal scene
in the West?
Marshall: Black Sabbath and Manowar are gods in the pantheon of metal.
The geography may be different but the heart is just as (if not more) zealous
than even the most devout scenes elsewhere in the world. The overall ethos
of the Botswana scene is very raw and honest.
In terms of music, the metal scene in Bots has its own style. African
culture remains evident. One of my favorite bands is called Remuda and
they hail from Maun. They sound like the African version of Thin Lizzy
meets Motorhead.
In the West, there is now a flashiness or pretentiousness that is very
commercial. In my opinion, what is happening in Botswana probably more
resembles what metal was like thirty years ago in the Bay Area Thrash
Siera. Black
and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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Marshall • Visions of Renegades 67
scene: when it truly was a counterculture and the style of music utterly
rejected and defied the mainstream.
TRANSITION: Do authorities ever interfere with metal shows?
Marshall: The authorities tolerate the shows. However, most of the clubs
and the venues are required by law to cease playing by around midnight.
The police show up like clockwork.
TRANSITION: What’s your impression of the racial climate within the
metal scene?
Marshall: In Botswana, the rockers have never really mixed with white
metal-heads from the so-called “outside world.” Metal’s inherent whiteness
is largely a moot point for them. They certainly admire and respect the
performers of metal from the U.S. and U.K. whom they idolize like anyone
else would. In some ways they admire those performers more than con-
temporary Western metal fans do. But they don’t get to watch these bands
Neo Rock.
Black and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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68 Transition 109
from overseas with the regularity and ease a Westerner could. So in short,
they have no racial prejudices whatsoever: this was certainly the case in
my own experience in being there. I never felt an awkward moment where
it was like “Oh…I’m the only white dude here.”
Whether or not guys like Eric Adams of Manowar or James Hetfield of
Metallica are white has no bearing on how fans in Botswana view or perceive
and appreciate the music. They seem to be oblivious to how race figures into
metal in both the global contemporary and historical sense. It was a very
endearing thing to behold for me. I’ve never brought up these issues with them
in conversation because it didn’t seem to matter to them at all.
TRANSITION: Have racist and white supremacist groups in Southern Africa
appropriated metal?
Marshall: I assume you are referring to the shootings at the Sikh Temple
in the U.S.? Well, I think that the media incorrectly labeled the U.S. hard-
core band Hatebreed as one of those groups that incites violence. They
The New
Number Six.
Black and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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Marshall • Visions of Renegades 69
were pigeonholed along with the guy who perpetrated the shootings, who
also had a hardcore band.
In August 2012, Wade Michael Page shot and killed six people at a Sikh
temple. He was a member of the hardcore neo-Nazi bands End Apathy and Definite
Hate. Hardcore is a distinct musical genre from metal.
Hatebreed plays very positive and empowering music. They champion
the underdogs in a lot of their music and have taken an active stance against
the problem of bullying. They are a great band. White supremacists haven’t
appropriated death metal. It was hardcore that the media pointed at. Hard-
core is more often associated with skinheads. Why? I really don’t know the
answer to that.
To my knowledge, there aren’t bands with any significant white suprema-
cist leanings in Southern Africa and certainly not in Botswana . There are, of
course, anti-religious themes in the lyrics of some bands in SA, but nothing
that doesn’t resemble what you’d expect to hear from similar bands on the
international scale. I don’t know of metal bands here that have incited any
sort of violence or discrimination. Some bands deal with political and racial
Sarah. Black
and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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70 Transition 109
issues in their lyrics. Most notably would be the songs like ‘Witman’ (white
man) or ‘Doodstraf’ (death penalty) by a prolific local metal band called
KOBUS! Their lyrics are very intelligent and often have a sarcastic tone with
regards to issues dealing with crime or race. In terms of the latter, for example
in the song Witman, they focus on the white man who feels disenfranchised
in “The New South Africa” in a kind or morbid but sarcastic way.
TRANSITION: What about the violence in death metal music?
Marshall: The death metal bands deal with the themes of gore, murder,
war, and violence in a kind of fictional and comic book fashion. It’s the
same in Botswana as in the rest of the world. I’d say metal music, although
aggressive, has a positive and empowering effect. The sonic power helps
people to deal with the problems of life. It gives you strength. I think that
aggressive and extreme forms of music have done more to release or express
rage or tension—in a safe way—than to cause or incite hatred or violence.
Metal is a positive force, despite what some people might say.
No Need
for Mercy
With a Fist
Full of Hate
(Undertaker).
Black and white
photograph.
© 2010 Frank
Marshall.
Courtesy of
the artist and
Rooke Gallery.
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Marshall • Visions of Renegades 71
TRANSITION: Have people been hurt at death metal shows?
Marshall: Randy Blythe, the front man of Lamb of God, was locked up
for over a month in the Czech Republic. He allegedly injured a fan who
had come onto stage, who later hit his head, causing a concussion which
lead to his death. In 2004 Dimebag Darrel of Pantera was shot to death on
stage by a crazed fan.
It’s easy to blame the music for these events, but it isn’t a fair criticism
in my opinion. People get killed every day for a myriad of reasons and in
many different circumstances. It’s just an easy sell for the press to say the
music caused these deaths.
TRANSITION: How are the mosh pits in Botswana?
Marshall: The shows in Botswana are not big enough for things like circle
pits or the ‘wall of death.’ The mosh pits aren’t as physical as what you’d
experience at a Lamb of God or Slayer show. Fans prefer to dance, head-
bang, and play air guitar. They will often climb up the rafters and hang
upside down and do piggy back-riding. They don’t purposefully or mali-
ciously hurt each other. I’ve never seen that happen. If someone falls, they
help them up. I mean, people do pick up cuts and bruises but nothing
serious.
We go to shows to enjoy the music. We don’t go to be thugs or to bully
others. All eyes are on the bands playing.
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