The name Weakling, according to founding member John Gossard, came from the title of a song by the band
Swans from their album
Filth. Weakling was initially started by guitarist John Gossard and guitarist/drum programmer Robert Williams of
Ubzub. The two ended up releasing an early version of "No One Can be Called As A Man While He'll Die" on a compilation tape
Wintergrief released by Nahitfol Productions in 1996. Briefly, Gossard and Williams continued with Weakling adding
Jim Mack on bass, and
Antoine Reuben Diavola on drums. Dissatisfied with the dedication of the members, Gossard left the band while the rest of the lineup continued on as Black Goat. The one idea contributed by Mack for the song "This Entire Fucking Battlefield" was later discovered to have been 'borrowed' from the Norwegian band Demonic's song "Nar Morket Faller". Prior to the release of the album, a few odd tales sprung up about the possible ways it could be distributed, including printing a single copy to be given to a single fan in
Europe or burying copies of the album in the ground and giving maps to fans who wanted to find them. Band leader John Gossard has since decried the spread of these stories as a publicity stunt pulled by the band's record label noting that the ideas were never intended to be more than a joke between the band members. Initially, Weakling was mainly noted for featuring guitarist Josh Smith of
The Fucking Champs (fellow Champ Tim Green served as producer), but a recent reissue of their material has brought their work some more attention, and the album has been hailed in some circles, and by musicians including
Fenriz of
Darkthrone, as a masterpiece. Weakling's sound displays inspiration from the works of
Scandinavian bands like
Bathory,
Burzum and
Darkthrone, as one might imagine it filtered through the lens of '70s
progressive rock: all five songs on the 76-minute album run at least 10 minutes in length and each is composed of at least 2 distinct sections. Gossard and bassist Sarah Weiner later played together in the similarly short-lived
doom metal band The Gault (although Weiner was the drummer of that outfit); after that band's demise, Gossard went on to join established
funeral doom outfit Asunder, and formed a second black metal band, Dispirit, in the wake of Asunder's dissolution. Keyboardist Casey Ward currently plays drums in
The Husbands. Drummer Sam Foster currently plays drums for
death metal band Saros. Although Weakling has never officially announced a split, they broke up in 1999. ==Members==