Heltir

Heltir was one of the less prolific side projects for erstwhile Christian Death frontman Rozz Williams. Mostly a solo venture, Heltir gave Williams the chance to experiment with some of his favorite latter-day concerns: spoken word poetry, sampled loops, sound collages, and the noisier, more avant-garde wing of industrial music. After leaving Christian Death in 1985, Williams worked simultaneously with several different ventures, including Premature Ejaculation and Shadow Project; Heltir was born in San Francisco in 1987 and ran more sporadically than its brethren. At first, Williams gave solo performances as Heltir, working mostly behind a mixing board; he also recorded three cassette-only releases, which appeared on Premature Ejaculation bandmate Chuck Collison's Happiest Tapes on Earth label. When Williams finally assembled the first widely available Heltir album, he changed his approach somewhat, adding more vocals and working with guest contributors, most notably Ace Farren Ford. Released by Triple X in 1995, Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) also featured harpist Aaron Schwartz and percussionist Christian Omar Madrigal Izzo, and sampled a wide variety of sources, including some world music, in addition to Williams' multi-instrumental improvisations. Williams continued to perform off and on as Heltir until his suicide on April 1, 1998. ~ Steve Huey