It makes me want to run screaming in primitive joy, detonating nuclear
bombs, tearing down the city of Manchester and makes the perfect
soundtrack to watching the sun go down as I walk the fifty minute trek
through park, wastelands and dingy back streets, across the concrete
divide to Planet K. It's a tape of early Killing Joke demos and live
things and the wired conviction of that tribal drumming, barbarically
electrifying distorted synth and lyrical visions of armageddon are
still very potent, and show up much of the 'rock music' that has come
along since as the vapid piffle it is.
Amazingly in Planet K things were even more perfectly apocalyptic. The
stage is bare, as if swept clean of life, but there's a massive
headcleaning electric crackle resonating across the space as blue white
rectangles flicker where performers are missing. The hum seems a
logical stripping of Killing Joke to its essential wired core -
Coleman's overloading synth. Occasional deep bass pulses shake the
foundations at too slow a pace to register timing. Kevin Drumm is
perched behind a laptop at the sound desk and is responsible for this
overpowering purging noise.
This being Manchester, home of Buzzcocks, it could've been time to
crack a bad Boredom pun about the Drumm hum but Mike Ladd wasn't
allowing us any downtime. The band ambled on and launched as the Drumm
fizzled out.
Was this the new dawn after the nuclear storm?
After Drumm's precise tones the sound was relatively muddy for the full
on four piece with drums, raps, guitar/computer and turntables. Mike
Ladd has a T-shirt emblazoned with the legend Afro Punk and gives us
some spiel about his inspirations Bad Brains, Black Flag and Fishbone.
Why do Americans in Europe eat at Pizza Hut? There are bigger questions
but this between song joke exemplified the imperialist cloak of the
'free' market before Ladd scratched and funked his mark as an
infesticon (opposed to majesticon).
It was a shame that Drumm didn't get another set before Tortoise did
their thing. They did a professional set with much instrument swapping
and it didn't really take off until the second half. I think they
launched into what seemed like a freeform jam in the middle of TNT (or
was it another track its hard to tell with all this lack of words) and
Herndon was really giving it some at the drums. It was neat the way
they almost seemed to lose control there...
The last trio of songs nailed it. A silence still at their instruments
then BLAM! Senceca unleashed that dual guitar duel and the fire and
fury was in their eyes and hearts. If only they could make a whole
album like that first two minutes of free falling two turning
pluck'n'strum'n'drum! Then the much requested Djed was an eye opener
that faded like the setting sun as McEntire and Herndon decelerated
their vibraphone runs.
Where Drumm had sparked off a cleansing fire and Ladd had the diatribes
and plans and notions to free nations, Tortoise were embracing visions
of post-apocalyptic utopianism - a new dawn after the flood that will
wash away the masters and leave the servants what is left of the world.
Ladd was back with a vision to take into the night as the final bars of
the Tortoise European leg faded into the smoke.
The meek shall inherit the mirth.
Don't burn the flag, lets burn the Bush.