Earlier today, we posted a confusing story about what, at the time, looked like clothing outlet H&M creating a dumb viral campaign around a new line of t-shirts and jackets featuring unknown band patches. The campaign then created all these fake band profiles with actual music that sounded like it could've been a part of that scene and for extra authenticity included some neo-nazi/NSBM imagery.
At the time, we were confused as to why H&M would ever pull a stunt like this. We got in brief correspondence with somebody at H&M who had no clue what we were talking about and promised a full response to the story tomorrow. I was tweeting with colleagues all day and the only rationalization that could make sense to us was that this was all a giant troll. H&M are not behind this. They made up some band names and some patches to put on jackets to sell and then somebody, with solid knowledge of the metal scene and a lot of free time on their hands, basically created a back story for all the patches.
The story has since blown up and whomever is behind the promo company that initiated this story is slowly reeling back. A few hours ago, they denied that H&M was behind this:
Hello you crazy metal heads!! Some of you really think we are H&M behind this? That´s ridiculous! Are you on drugs? We love H&M! We are a new and rising record label, hungry to bring you great new bands! Even if our campaign has been a bit controversial we are serious and taking the scene by storm! We have just signed the best Thrash Metal act since 1987! Ladies and gentleman cut your crap! Here is something you want to hear: From Bristol, UK we bring you METAL!!!!!
Just one hour ago, it seems they took it even further, admitting this was all an "art project"…
YOU ALL HAVE BEEN UNDER INFLUENCE OF THE STRONG SCENE.
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. It was you all who read something which you didn´t care to understand. 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. The whole project was to show that not all metal music is what you hear in commercial forms, and different subgenres exist even within metal music.
THANK YOU FOR WITNESSING THIS- FOR ONE MORE TIME, LET´S CELEBRATE THIS WITH METAL.
They included one final link, which is their interpretation of a thrash song with a photo of Cliff Burton on it:
What's interesting is that in one post they write they are a label and then immediately after, they deny it. Also, I don't get the comparisons to Monty Python or Spinal Tap, this is not parody. I guess maybe they are saying they took these names and logos and assumed what they would sound like as a parody of the real bands.
As we previously reported, any trace of these bands only goes back about a week or two. This was a very carefully orchestrated plan by an "art collective" with a lot of time on their hands to create promo material or maybe this was all a giant PR stunt by H&M that blew up in their face when we started calling them out on it and then they backpedaled.
What do you think really happened?
