Kranky Klaus / BB / Spook House: Press coverage

Art Review, November 2003:
"Christmas in Austria is weird. On 6 December, the villagers are visited by St Nicholas, who brings them seasonal gifts. But with him comes the Krampus, hairy beasts with horns that give naughty children what they deserve: they drag them out of the house, beat them up and scrub their faces with snow. Cameron Jamie filmed this strange ritual in Kranky Klaus..."

Frieze, Issue 83:
"Spook House is the outcome of almost a lifetime's work. Since his early teens Jamie has been photographing the elaborate and macabre tableaux that spring up all over the valley at Halloween. For Spook House he went to Detroit, where suburban disaffection, if anything, runs even deeper. We see front lawns that have been turned into grizzly cemetries and cellars that are now death row penitentiaries. A modest entrance fee admits one to the 'Fear Factory Haunted Hayride', the 'Chamber of Torture' and the 'Cannibal Cafeteria' - where 'manburgers' are served and a human arm roasts on a BBQ. Technically thse vernacular installations can be astonishing; hydraulics cause corpses to sit up, pulleys make a ghost glide through the air on wires, and an old sedan holding a bloody crash victim fills with smoke. Everywhere there are kids or mannequins dressed as vampires, zombies, werewolves, witches, aliens, leering clowns, disembodied heads, headless bodies, Freddie Krugers, Frankensteins and Osama Bin Ladens." (Alex Farquharson - read full article)

Word Magazine:
"As 150 Melvins fans gather on the seats of the Waughton Centre's sports hall, the band emerge in complete darkness. No-one can see them, but they are wearing bizarre garb - Osborne in a Satanic cassock, his bandmates in flimsy ladies' clothes. Before the films begin, they hammer through some testing art noise; then Jamie's Kranky Klaus rolls out on the big screen and suddenly The Melvins' music sounds awesome. This is the most compelling film of the three, documenting an annual December ritual in the small Austrian town of Badgestein, where people dress up as the mythical horned beast Krampus. If kids have been bad, they are mauled in an often overly-enthusiastic fashion. 'I met a man,' Jamie relates, 'whose eye was gouged out by a Krampus horn in the early '70s. He was proud of it. Austrians have a very masochistic culture.'" (Jason Arnopp)

The Wire, January 2004:
"[Kranky Klaus's] mix of stoner Metal guitar explosion, crazed percussion power and Jamie's recordings of demonic bells gives the piece a feel that belongs more to 20th century electronic music than rock 'n' roll. This attitude to recorded sound is something that Jamie jas always found attractive and instructive." (Edwin Pouncey)

Rock Sound, January 2004:
"A gunshot-like drum fires into the dark, jolting attentions, and led by Buzz Osbourne, the trio launch into an oozing pile of black grooves while the disturbing, fleece-clad, horned demons terrorise the people of Austria, bucking and bruising above them. A set of low-end resonance, sub-bass throbs and driving beat accompanies the grinning skulls and gardens-cum-cemetries of Spook House." (Ronnie Kerswell)