I have some down-time now as Fraser (http://www.fraseredwards.net/) complete's the work on producing my album.
So, some source material for you all whilst final track revisions take place (c>3 months). I must recommend this book if you are at all intrigued by WW1 (I have an undergraduate degree in history - they don't teach this in the academy). I've read Falkenhayn's and Lundendorff's memoirs - this is far more important than those revisioinist retellings.
Storm of Steel. This book was very popular/lauded in the Third Reich - it served the purpose with regards to placing the soldier as the 'first person of the state' ie the 'Übermensch' and additionaly, brutalising an entire society. They missed the mark by an unfathomable amount - there is utterly no glory or politics out there (...Sabaton...). This is just a basic description of exactly what it was like in the trenches. It's fucking aweful stuff (Guillemont 'field of body-parts').
It's a vicirial account of the horrors of the common man in the trenches in WW1, experienced first hand. Nothing sentimental. Nothing glorious. Nothing political. Just farmhand's thrown into the maw. It's dreadful. I would also recommend Alastair Horne's 'The Price of Glory' if you enjoy this. It should be read for context alone, as Hitler was also in the trenches in these battles. This is were humanity lived, or died.
A chapter sticks with me. The Great Battle. March 21st, 1918. German Stormtropper's conceading admiration that the Kilt-wearing Cameronian's were 'real men', having just killed many of them in hand-to-hand combat, is frightful. Also, the no-mans-land scene - you will just have to discover that for yourselves.
More content soon - Best, Gregor