PERSONALITIES THAT WERE INFLUENTIAL ON ROTGOD

Personalities that were influential on Rotgod

Rotgod's music, concept and lyrics were not only influenced by old school metal/punk bands, but even by very well-known figures that stand well outside the underground metal subculture, going from big-brained philosophers and intellectuals to grotesque Internet lolcows - however, all of them united by their controversial, divisive status that fully mirrors and represents Rotgod's general attitude. Let's see who these filthy fuckers are!

Julien Offray de La Mettrie

French philosopher and doctor who helped pioneer materialism during the Enlightenment era, bringing it to the logical conclusion most other philosophers were too afraid to dabble in - that being, hedonism, libertinism and sensualism. His ideas, back then, were enough for him to be persecuted all through Europe, forcing him to seek protection among various courts. It's been told that he died of an indigestion after gorging himself at a banquet: whether true or a hoax, it's pretty much the perfect, most badass death for a reckless advocate for sensual pleasure as he was. He was especially influential on the song "Organic machine", inspired indeed by his best-known book "L'homme machine" I read around the time I was starting Rotgod, back in 2015.

Satan (Al Pacino) from "The devil's advocate" (1997)

The best depiction of the devil I've ever seen, one of the most charming characters ever put to screen, he was a deep influence on Rotgod - and his legendary monologue about God was quoted in the chorus for "The serpent's speech". His loving, indulgent attitude towards human vices was at the core of the "cynical humanism" concept I was going for at the time of "Sonic degeneracy".

"I'm a humanist... maybe the last humanist!"

Andrea Diprè

One of the most controversial personalities here in Italy, he started out as a lawyer and "art critic" (quotation marks emphasized), before gaining online fame and being dragged into a vortex of pornography, drugs, extreme sex, grotesque Internet lolcows, gratuitous ragebait, and more horrors beyond human comprehension - pretty much what Rotgod represents in a nutshell. Basically a modern GG Allin, he embodies the essence of hedonism, libertinism and sensual pleasure (aka: "dipreism") arguably to a fault, but I champion him just for that and homaged him on "Sybaritic metal" (whose title is inspired to an archaic word, "sybaritic", often used by Diprè as a way of saying "luxurious", "indulgent").

Marquis De Sade

An important figure for Rotgod's current course, in full continuity with the aforementioned personalities. Like La Mettrie, he was a controversial Enlightenment thinker from France, and he wrote some of the most obscene poems the world had seen up until that point (well, there's a reason if people taking pleasure from inflicting pain on others are currently deemed "sadists" after all). On the back of the "Polemics and obscenity" double CD, I included a De Sade quote that perfectly encapsulates the attitude I've always wanted to convey with Rotgod - and I can guarantee you, it's not going to change anytime soon.

Friedrich Nietzsche

A very influential figure for Rotgod, though not in the sense most would assume. I'm definitely more into the earlier chunk of his work (such as "Human all too human" or "The gay science"), and much less into the later, Ubermensch/will-to-power oriented stuff. Still, the name "Rotgod" comes from the concept of "divine putrefaction" that's inherent to the famous "God is dead" aphorism, and in the early days of Rotgod I was even planning to make a song about it, which would be called "God is dead - yet his corpse still fuckin' stinks".

Later on, I'd end up being more drawn to exploring Nietzsche's gradual descent into madness, presuming a correlation with the impact a beautiful woman named Lou von Salomé had in his life - after which he'd start writing his most outlandish, mystical works such as "Zarathustra", ultimately succumbing to folly while residing in Turin. All this stuff was enough to inspire two songs in my catalog - those being "Salomé" and "Eternal return (january 3, 1889 - june 28, 2022)". Oh, and those dates - they are definitely related.