Big brands and corporations attempting to co-opt underground scenes they know next to nothing about is nothing new. Many of us remember the debacles of the ’90s when “grunge fashion” was being shown off on Paris catwalks and Tommy Hilfiger tried to go hip-hop.
But the latest case comes courtesy of Swedish clothing brand H&M. As Metal Injection reports, the retailer recently licensed some Metallica and Slayer designs to sell as part of a new range of metal-inspired designs that they are currently pushing.
The Metallica and Slayer shirts are actually cheaper than buying direct from the band, while T-shirts and patch-covered jackets bearing names like Mortus, Mystic Triangle, and Grey, well, these bands don’t actually seem to exist outside of the clothes.
Or do they? A thread on the metal sub-Reddit has called into question a new marketing campaign by Strong Scene Productions, which claims to have all of these bands and more signed to their roster and that they’re working with H&M to highlight the groups.
On the surface, everything looks legit. Pretty lame and totally not metal, but it all checks out. Except, while Strong Scene claim to have been founded in 1999, they only recently launched a Facebook page and none of their bands have any info listed on their official website.
If you look up any of these bands, in fact, all of the info only dates back to this month. However, music claimed to have been created by these bands has appeared online, though once again, all of the clips are dated as having been uploaded this month.
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Okay, so it’s a viral marketing stunt pulled off by H&M. No different to when the makers of The Blair Witch Project released fake missing posters, right? Well, this one is a little different, a little more, ahem, inappropriate.
Two of the bands seem to have ties to the NSBM scene. For those unfamiliar with the term, it stands for National Socalist Black Metal, a scene of metal bands, mostly in Europe, whose lyrics and artwork promote neo-Nazism and racism.
A bio for The One lists them as being affiliated with the record label National Heritage Pride and the band Lany use imagery of Adolf Hitler on their band profile. If this is all a marketing stunt, it’s taking things a little too far.
When Metal Injection called H&M corporate, a representative reportedly “seemed confused by the whole ordeal and asked for links”, asking for links and noting that it was late in his country and they would release an official statement soon.
It’s not surprising the H&M rep wasn’t familiar with the campaign, because the whole thing was apparently a stunt by an unidentified art group. In a statement released of their Facebook page, Strong Scene Productions copped to the whole thing.
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“We have never stated to collaborate with H&M in any way but only to create pieces of music inspired by their new spring collection,” they write. “And unfortunately people twisted and misunderstood it badly.”
“We are not a label, but a one-time improvised, collective art project in the vein of Spinal Tap, Monty Python and the Yes Men with no intentions on anything except for art.” They claim their intent was to show that metal music is more than what we hear commercially.
Whether or not this is true is up for debate. We prefer the idea that they were just pissed off by a Swedish clothing retailer with no knowledge of metal hijacking their scene and looking to pull off an epic troll.
