prior to the release of their second album, the band became the subject of controversy surrounding remarks that mills had made in the "nme" and "melody maker", regarding the swastika, calling it a "brilliant image" albeit in the context of its traditional indian origins. "the independent on sunday" ran a front page article in april 1997 reprinting mills' comments and alleging that the guitarist "had dabbled with nazism". the negative publicity surrounding the incident, along with overexposure in the british media, hurt the band's sales. the "independent" article also revealed that the "objects of desire" had used the motto "england will rise again", and had performed at a 1993 conference at wembley called "global deception" at which speakers included renowned conspiracy theorists eustace mullins and william cooper.