Killing Joke
Pandemonium

THE REVIEW

Four years, a good pause to sort out some ideas and then off we go again, another round, another ride, the story of Killing Joke is enriched with a new, thrilling chapter; with the stunning "Extremities, Dirt..." in 1990, Jaz Coleman, Geordie Walker, and company had made a forceful entry into the metal realm, with which they had nonetheless flirted more or less intensely since the dawn of their artistic journey. "Pandemonium" continues in many ways the discourse started by its predecessor, but in many others, it diverges, seeks new sounds and expressive styles, changes the game, and expresses itself in a different language. 

In "Extremities..." what struck the most was the hardness, the rage, the explicit lyrics. "Pandemonium" instead gives more space to the shamanic and ritualistic side of Killing Joke: the lyrics are more nuanced, allusive, at times introspective and poetic, focused more on man and his instincts rather than the context surrounding him; as for the strictly musical aspect, Geordie Walker's guitar becomes even harder and more metallic than the previous chapter, but undoubtedly the rhythmic component dominates, an incessant groove, the groove of a long ritual dance in several acts, the rite of a post-industrial animist tribe, with bass, drums, and synthesizers instead of traditional drums and maracas, and the sorcerer Jaz Coleman intoning ancestral chants.

This is an album of rhythm that makes you move, makes you dance: songs like "Exorcism" and "Whiteout" flaunt monotone and repetitive structures, in a positive sense, hypnotic mantras interpreted by a more acidic Jaz than ever, who for a large part of the album showcases the most animalistic side of his voice, a deep and imperious howl. Exceptions to these style elements include episodes like "Pandemonium", an elegant, imaginative, and visionary track enriched by the presence of a violin that adds a Middle Eastern hue to Geordie's granitic riffs and the hypnotic bass of the returning Youth, the fascinating midtempo "Communion", also enriched by Arabesque percussion and orchestrations that give life to an ancient otherworldly ritual, an apparition, the evocation of a spiritual world, and the melancholic and desperate atmosphere of "Jana", where even Youth's bass becomes gentler and Jaz's voice softens to intone a sad chant in which the specter of AIDS emerges in all its malignancy, mowing down a young life like an insidious angel of death.

The predominant component of "Pandemonium" is, however, the rhythm, a rhythm that conquers, an epic and overwhelming rhythm that reveals itself in all its strength in a track like "Millennium", brilliant, compelling, anthemic, with an immediate and irresistible chorus that showcases all of Jaz Coleman's melodic abilities, which also emerge from the rock-tinged "Black Moon", with Martin Glover as the absolute protagonist. Worthy of note are the dramatic "Pleasures Of The Flesh", a hallucinatory journey into the most primal instinct of man, and finally the last dance, "Mathematics Of Chaos", characterized by a continuous, incessant, immutable beat that moves from within in an apocalyptic dancefloor atmosphere, a robotic trance that unfolds for over seven minutes.

 "Pandemonium", the ninth album by the Killing Joke is nothing but a great confirmation, if ever there was a need to further confirm, after such a career, the qualities of eclecticism and genius of this group. "Extremities..." showed us the angriest and gloomiest Killing Joke, "Pandemonium", with uncommon inspiration, balance, and melodic sense, returns them to a more imaginative dimension. An eclectic, grandiose, refined, fascinating album, slightly inferior to its predecessor in terms of expressive vigor and urgency but still majestic, this is the adjective that best suits it, and so I conclude the second chapter of my brief retrospective on these unjustly forgotten Killing Joke.