KMFDM Speaks Out On Link To 'Trench Coat Mafia'

04/22/1999 4:00 AM, Yahoo! Music
Craig Rosen

(4/22/99, 1 a.m. PDT) - One of the acts apparently cited on a "Trench Coat Mafia" website (LAUNCH, 4/21), allegedly operated by one of the two gunmen in Tuesday's Littleton, Colo. mass murder, was veteran industrialists KMFDM.

The fact that the band's name turned up in connection to the worst school massacre in U.S. history was not lost on former KMFDM leader Sascha Konietzko, who has issued a statement attempting to distance the group from the tragedy and the alleged beliefs of the so-called "Trench Coat Mafia."

"First and foremost, KMFDM would like to express their deep and heartfelt sympathy for the parents, families, and friends of the murdered and injured children in Littleton," said Konietzko in a statement. "We are sick and appalled, as is the rest of the nation, by what took place in Colorado yesterday.

"KMFDM are an art form--not a political party. From the beginning, our music has been a statement against war, oppression, fascism, and violence against others," he adds. "While some of the former band members are German as reported in the media, none of us condone any Nazi beliefs whatsoever."

It's interesting that Konietzko speaks of KMFDM in the present tense in spite of the fact that he recently announced that the group had called it quits. He has subsequently resurfaced with Tim Skold in a new group called MDFMK (LAUNCH, 3/1). For those not suffering from dyslexia, that's KMFDM backwards.

In another eerie connection to the Columbine High School slayings, KMFDM's final album, Adios, was released on Tuesday, the same day that the killings took place.

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