Killing Joke’s ‘Ritualized Catharsis’
An archived interview with Jaz Coleman on his 65th birthday
Twenty-two years ago, I was talking to Killing Joke’s Jaz Coleman and the idea of taking an optimistic or pessimistic view of the world arose.
I figured Coleman would fall decidedly on the pessimistic side of things — I mean, I’d been listening to the music and seeing Killing Joke in concert since 1979.
Nope. “I’m an eternal optimist,” Killing Joke’s bandleader-singer-keyboardist said. “How can we dare have children and not believe in the future?”
Killing Joke’s music was thick, grinding, swaying. If the music dealt with war, Coleman – who often sported streaks of black greasepaint on his face in concert – noted it wasn’t just the external kind – the United States had launched its attack on Iraq shortly before we spoke – but also ‘about the inner turmoil, the war that goes on inside. What is it about human beings that we have to destroy and create havoc? It beats me, but there you have it.”
The band’s mission? “We’re coming to bring comfort to people,” Coleman said. “It’s like a sanctuary to people from the outside world. It feels like 50,000 volts going through my body.”
Killing Joke has never been for the faint of heart. My friend Peter Prescott, ex-Mission of Burma drummer and current bandleader of minibeast, put it this way a long time ago: “It’s a monolith, a big, fat slab.” Paul Ferguson, the band’s drummer, once described what Killing Joke created as “the sound of the earth vomiting.”
Coleman considered that take for a moment and said, “It’s a good description. So many things are happening to the planet. I think it could be a cataclysmic time.”
This time, Coleman and I were speaking in 2010, on the occasion the release of the harsh, riveting Absolute Dissent album, and a highly anticipated American club tour.
“I’m concerned most about our food supply and climate change,” he said. “We’re on the verge of a resource war. I’m afraid I don’t hold out a lot of hope that suddenly we’re gong to change our ways overnight. The only thing that can do this is shock.”
Of the moment then, maybe more of the moment now.
The English band, which existed from 1979-1996 and then again from 2002 onward, has provided many of its own musical shocks since it first formed. They were part of punk’s second wave, bringing industrial rock, metal and punk together with songs like “Change,” “Requiem,” “Wardance” and “Eighties.” The music conjured up feelings of apocalypse now and forever.
The four members of the original band — Coleman, Ferguson, guitarist Kevin “Geordie” Walker, and bassist Youth — re-grouped in 2008, following the death of bassist Paul Raven. They all met at Raven’s funeral in France.
Anyway, at Raven’s wake, Coleman said, “Of course, we all started partying as Raven would have had it. The key words at the funeral was Raven’s favorite line from Nietzsche, something to the effect of, ‘When a great man dies, men put aside their differences and make solemn vows.’ It was kind of a call to arms.”
So, we opened up the portals with Coleman, who turns 65 today.
When original band members reunite so long after formation, you wonder about motivation and commitment. You prepare to cringe. But you guys are still creative and full of fury. Why?
Well, we’ve never had too much money (laughs) and I think that we’re very close to people on the street, still. I think it’s because everyone’s lived a very colorful life and the music’s colorful. It’s really that simple.
Absolute Dissent is a monster, a tower of rage. It seems like your dissent is against most anything and everything.
That’s right. I don’t think I need to spell it out. You can use your imagination on that one. Look at the state of the world. One hell of an upheaval is coming.
Some people think Killing Joke is nihilistic. But that’s not quite accurate, is it?
I don’t think so. I think many people failed to see our humor. The planet seems to be in a dreadful state and I don’t like the development of so many things in our modern world, I don’t know where to begin and where to end. But in saying that, I still find a lot of meaning and goodness in this life, good people. Somehow, we have to make this level of existence better. The notion of beautifying existence on some level, I think it’s a moral duty of citizens to go for this one way or another.
Do you think Killing Joke helps in that regard?
Sure, I do, because when we started out in 1979, we all believed in the idea of a renaissance and it was something that was shared at Killing Joke concerts then and now. There are places where people go to talk and hang out with other like-minded individuals.
Is there catharsis in the music?
Oh, we use it. Killing Joke is ritualized catharsis. We all do it together. The lyrics are in the form of a mantra of very disturbing subject matter. The idea is kind of homeopathic, the idea of immunizing yourself against the sickness is to take a little bit of the sickness. It’s the way we come to terms with it and address it.
Do you think about Killing Joke’s legacy?
I’ve had three decades to consider it. Killing Joke: Is it a force of good? And the answer is “Yes, it is.” A good tree cannot bear a bad fruit and a bad tree cannot bear a good fruit. I can only see the sweet ripe mangos everywhere! And if you meet the members of Killing Joke, you’ll find them the most humorous, good-spirited individuals, by no means morose or miserable in any way.
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You lead something of a double life. You won awards in classical music as a kid and became a classical composer and conductor, too, working in New Zealand and all over Europe. You did an opera in front of the Queen of England.
I’m with the Berlin Orchestra at the moment and the Prague Chamber Orchestra. I’m moving to Paris to do some things, too.
How do these worlds relate?
They’re two completely different worlds that bear no relationship to each other, other than the fact they’re both music. The audiences are different and the concert halls are different.
If I were to ask which is closer to the real you, would it be the orchestral guy?
Probably the other way around.
So how did the classical kid become a punk rocker?
I can tell you the evening it happened. I was over training with the Chamber Orchestra, an offshoot of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. I was 14 at the time. There was this very, very pretty young cellist who said to me, “Don’t you listen to any other music than classical music?” I said, “Oh, no I don’t. You mean ‘Top of the Pops’ kind of stuff?” and she said, “No much more experimental stuff.” I hadn’t really heard any.
She said, “I’ve got some tapes,” so I went back to her room and she said to me, “Have you ever taken drugs? I said “No,” and she said, “I smoke a bit of pot. You wanna try some?” So, I ended up smoking this pot, listening to Can and losing my virginity in the process. The very next day I was converted and wearing black. And while my parents were away, I got my violin and went down to Sotheby’s, sold it and bought a synthesizer.
***
Killing Joke today? Geordie died from a stroke in 2023 at 64. In an interview last year with the Guardian, Coleman, who was beginning a spoken word tour, said, “I’m asking people not to ask about the future of Killing Joke because I’m still in mourning.”
Their last studio recording, Pylon, came out a decade ago. They last played live two years ago. At present, no dates are listed on their website as coming up.
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