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Chiave di volta dello storico passaggio dal punk alla new wave e pilastro fondamentale del rinnovamento del rock odierno, i Killing Joke di Jaz Coleman pubblicano un nuovo album confermando di essere una delle rare band anglosassoni ancora in attività a mantenersi fedeli alla propria linea stilistica, nonchè a conservare dignità e decoro nonostante gli alti e bassi di una carriera di grande peso.
Orfani del compianto Paul Raven (rip), Coleman e soci tornano alla ribalta con "Absolute Dissent", un album che fin dalla copertina la dice lunga sulle idee e ideologie che da tempo hanno sposato ed elaborato senza stemperare l'approccio; anzi, ricruentando nel tempo una volontà di discussione che ha continuato ad esprimersi con energia devastante (specialmente da "Extremities..." in avanti). E sebbene questo nuovo lavoro abbia un respiro meno aggressivo ed urlante rispetto al "Killing Joke" del 2003, i contenuti restano comunque in linea con la radice sociologica - e politica - di questo ensemble dotato di intuizioni folgoranti e di un design sonoro imitatissimo.
Fin dalle prime tracce l'impressione è quella di un percorso a ritroso negli anni, che ritrova ombre e luci di almeno quattro o cinque album precedenti, riportando una certa vena melodica e malinconica a mescolarsi con le sfuriate ritmiche a cui ultimamente ci avevano abituato. Anche le contaminazioni elettroniche compaiono a sprazzi a sottolineare che la loro musica non si è mai posta preconcetti di comunicazione e che al giorno d'oggi tutto è sdoganato e lecito per attribuire un'atmosfera o una sensazione a una canzone.
Ecco allora che ai sincopati inni di "In excelsis" e della title-track "Absolute Dissent" si alternano la scorribanda techno-industrial di "European Super State" e la tarantella selvaggia di "Endgame", fino al punk-rock del nuovo millennio "Here comes the singularity" che chiude il disco. In tutto 11 brani che non concedono tregua e abbondano di chitarre distorte e basso compatto, con il vocione sempre più stravolto di Jaz a recitare le sue litanie nervose di cerimoniere esoterico. Piuttosto lontano da certe interminabili risonanze epiche che avevamo trovato nel precedente "Hosannas from the basement of hell" e più vicine, come si diceva, a quel melange malinconico-postatomico tipico di altri album, dove l'immagine di un mondo votato alla corruzione e alla catastrofe sembrava trovare nei Killing Joke i suoi cantastorie più realistici e disillusi.
Certo, non è semplice valutare oggettivamente l'opera di artisti che hanno condizionato la scena rock per trent'anni e che, ovviamente, oggi sono stati affiancati da una folta schiera di seguaci ed imitatori. Se da un lato la forza proprompente del loro stile riesce a coinvolgere e a tenere alto il vessillo, dall'altro è indubbio che non siano rimasti molti spazi per la sperimentazione e il rinnovamento. "Absolute Dissent" è un buon album, che non tradisce i fans e può sedurre i neofiti; ma in una prospettiva completa non può reggere il confronto con altri titoli di una nutrita e gloriosa discografia.
Più interessante, in questo senso, un'analisi delle liriche, a cui la musica sembra piegarsi per sorreggerne l'impeto comunicativo e i sottintesi allegorici, dimostrando che su questo piano i Killing Joke sono stati sì imitati, ma come recita il loro motto "semper imitatum, numquam idem".
Elenco tracce e testi
01 The Wait (04:53)
My [tiv's] changing
Day to day
The fiery kisses
Fast decay
I look up the river
My firm thoughts down
The block they've poisoned
Gotta sit tight
The wait
Odd awakening
The silence grows
Screams outside
Distortion shows
New jump force
Bad bad billys
It's just another [vine]
Of distorted greed
The wait
03 Primitive (04:00)
Primitive feeling
Primitive way
Getting closer
To the primitive day
Intuition
Wherever it goes
The primitive day
The primitive way
Primitive feeling
Primitive way
Getting closer
To the primitive day
Follow the feeling
Wherever it goes
The primitive day
The primitive way
04 Pssyche (05:00)
You're alone in the pack
You're feeling like you wanna go home
You're feeling life's finished,but you keep on going
The reason is there
You won't find it till you've been and gone because you're living a hoax!
Someones got you sussed!
Dull your brain, or seek inspiration
You feel illusion,and then you finally say transfer
Transorm a machine, to play with your head
So you can stand back and watch,or take part and learn
If you don't know the game,then you're still part of it
Because out on the streets it's strange
To see the show
Knowing full well that you're on the range
Dodge the bullets! or carry the gun,the choice is yours
Look at the controller
A Nazi with a social degree
A middle-class hero
rapist with your eyes on me
A priest of masturbation,a priest yeh to the nuns you fuck
You'd wipe out spastics if you had the chance,but Jesus wouldn't like it
No
05 Love Like Blood (03:42)
We must play our lives like soldiers in the field.
The life is short
I'm running faster all the time.
Strength and beauty destined to decay
so cut the rose in full bloom.
Till the fearless come and the act is done
A love like blood
a love like blood.
Till the fearless come and the act is done
A love like blood
a love like blood.
Everyday through all frustration and despair
Love and hate fight with burning hearts.
Till legends live and man is god again
And self-preservation rules the day no more.
We must dream of promised lands and fields
that's never fade in season
As we move towards no end
we leani to die.
Red tears are shed on grey.
Till the fearless come and the act is done
. . .
Till the fearless come and the act is done
. . .
07 Wardance (03:30)
The atmosphere's strange
Out on the town
Music for pleasure
It's not music no more
Music to dance to
Music to move
This is music to march to
IT'S a war dance
A war dance
Look at the victim
Scrawled on the wall
You know the the reason
Outside the door
You got something
Nasty in your mind
Trying to get out
IT'S a war dance
A war dance
We walk round the pitch
Honesty is sick
Try to be honest
Look what you get
The food runs short
And then the money talks
One way out
YOUR PREMONITION IS CORRECT
A war dance
08 Pssyche (04:11)
You're alone in the pack
You're feeling like you wanna go home
You're feeling life's finished,but you keep on going
The reason is there
You won't find it till you've been and gone because you're living a hoax!
Someones got you sussed!
Dull your brain, or seek inspiration
You feel illusion,and then you finally say transfer
Transorm a machine, to play with your head
So you can stand back and watch,or take part and learn
If you don't know the game,then you're still part of it
Because out on the streets it's strange
To see the show
Knowing full well that you're on the range
Dodge the bullets! or carry the gun,the choice is yours
Look at the controller
A Nazi with a social degree
A middle-class hero
rapist with your eyes on me
A priest of masturbation,a priest yeh to the nuns you fuck
You'd wipe out spastics if you had the chance,but Jesus wouldn't like it
No
09 Millennium (05:25)
I was born to see two thousand years
Of man's effect upon the planet
Extinction seems to be a plausible risk
Whatever happens well i'm part of all this
My life i've been waiting for this moment
All my life i've been waiting for this moment to come
Taste the salt of my tears
Take the wealth of my years
Singing in the millennium with you
[Resolutions for show]
Old ways don't seem to know
Singing in the millennium with you
Fire burn all our uncertainties
Water wash away impurities
Contradictions and predictions abound
Yes i believe that we can turn it around
My life i've been waiting for this moment
My life i've been waiting for this moment
All my life i've been waiting for this moment
All my life i've been waiting for this moment to come
11 Pandemonium (06:31)
She talks of supernatural aeons that we'll make
She says "look behind the wave of changes" feel the future taking shape
I can see tomorrow
I can see the world to come
I can see tomorrow
Hear the pandemonium
I ask her of her next of kin and loved ones in her care
She gestures all around her then she whispers "everywhere
"There is no nuclear family required any more
"My parents are the village and the village is the law"
I can see tomorrow
I can see the world to come
I can see tomorrow
Hear the pandemonium(x2)
She said "unlearn you must forget the values that you hold
"Life is not longevity and beauty is the only goal"
I can see tomorrow
I can see the world to come
I can see tomorrow
Hear the pandemonium(x2)
Cymbals that crash and pipes of pan awaken from your trance
There is no retribution here see how the heathen dance
I can see tomorrow
I can see the world to come
I can see tomorrow
Hear the pandemonium(x2)
--extra lyrics -- singles only
The prisoner sat motionless, his cell was six by four.
He walked to the horizon without walking through the door.
We found ourselves converging as we walked towards the sun.
Apart from all discussion, we were functioning as one.
I can see tomorrow
I can see the world to come
I can see tomorrow
Hear the pandemonium
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