September 9, 2008

Musician Chris Connelly has spent the past two decades playing with many of the groundbreaking bands in punk and industrial music, including Ministry. His newest work features introspective music and poetry that reflect on war and the world's refugees. Over the summer, Connelly performed at an event commemorating the United Nations International Day in Support of Torture Survivors, hosted by the Heartland Alliance Marjorie Kovler Center. Proceeds from his latest CD, Forgiveness and Exile, to be released this fall, will benefit the Marjorie Kovler Center.

How did you first hear about the work of the Heartland Alliance Marjorie Kovler Center?

I was seeing a doctor for a series of treatments about 10 years ago, and we used to talk a fair bit. She told me about the work of the Marjorie Kovler Center, and explained a lot about the plight of refugees who have suffered torture. She was a very, very good soul, and needless to say, what she told me moved me.

What made you decide to get involved with the Marjorie Kovler Center?

It had always been in the back of my mind since then that I wished to offer something, but it was only after the completion of the writing and recording of this new project that I realized that this would be a great time to get involved. It was a long process writing the words—longer than I usually take—and this was because I felt that I was writing for a purpose, and this was informed by horror stories that I had been reading about and hearing on the radio.

My son had just been born, and it certainly made me look at the value of life in a new way. But it was not just the arrival of a new child, it was a realization that suffering seemed to simply increase, alarmingly, and perhaps I could do something tiny that may help, as well as using what gifts I have as an artist to perhaps illustrate my feelings about it.

What sort of experiences in your background as a musician and performer influence your worldview now?

I started playing rock music (I was in the school choir before that!) in the late 1970s, and it was a time of great change in music. With the arrival of punk rock, which I embraced, came the arrival of a very constructive rebellion of sorts, where anyone could play music and write lyrics about issues that they thought mattered. In the 1980s, my band Fini Tribe played for a lot of humanitarian benefits and were very active in the campaign for nuclear disarmament. This carried on into Ministry, which was always a very politically charged band.

Tell me about your music now—what are your influences and goals as an artist? Describe the work on your newest CD.

On this new CD I have brought in a number of orators to read pieces of the long poem "Forgiveness and Exile," including actor Torri Higginson and singer Shirley Manson from Garbage. Both are close friends and were happy and excited about the project. These are not songs so much as poems with music. I suppose what I am interested in mostly right now is taking a very loose and minimal musical arrangement and using this as a backdrop for the words, kind of like a painter might prime a canvas and then color the background with the various shades needed before adding the focus. It was in this way that I "painted" what I feel is a somewhat impressionistic view of war, refugees, torture, and the horrifying things that happen in our world.

• Download an MP3 audio file from Chris Connelly

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