Band Of Holy Joy formed in New Cross, London and shone brightly between 1984 and 1993, briefly reforming in 2002 but they really resumed in earnest in 2007 returning to play live. They release a new album `Scorched Jerusalem` this month.
An electronic pulse like beat leads us into `Born To Sin` with vocals from Johny Brown that are part sung part spoken and feel almost pained as he shares a kind of stark outlook on life but where he assures us that with his help we can be redeemed and obtain a place in paradise. An off kilter tribal percussive beat sets a platform on `Stay Toxic` for a discourse on possibly being unable to resolve maybe societies problems and concluding that the best thing to do is just let it run its course.
`Nihilistic Ends` is initially a rhythmic meld of instrumentation including Balkan sounding violin hues before vocals join and the track becomes a real introspective slow burn reflecting on past indiscretions before moving to a fatalistic reflection on the narrator`s inability to change. There`s a kind of expansive feel to `Existential Kills` which becomes fairly mesmerising. If I’m honest the lyrical content was probably beyond my comprehension but may have been about life being a dream.
Title track `Scorched Jerusalem` is a discourse about the state of the world but with a ray of hope shining through shared over a waltz like musical accompaniment. There`s a brief almost drum and bass instrumental with some virtually indistinguishable vocals joining in the last thirty seconds on `Dead Romantics`
`Breivik Island` is an alluringly melodic offering which references Anders Behring Breivik the neo-Nazi terrorist who conducted the 2011 attacks in Norway killing eight people in a bomb explosion and a further sixty-nine at a Summer camp on the island of Utøya. There`s a charmingly almost Cure like upbeat composition in `French Riots` which has vocal harmonies and ends with the sound of a French police siren.
`Palace Commune` was a group of Parisian insurgents who set fire to the Tuileries Palace on May 23, 1871, as part of their attempt to overthrow the Third Republic. This number has a dreamy melancholic ambience and maybe imagines standing in the ruins of the palace and reflecting on what happened here and the world in general today. There`s a further profoundly wistful disturbing lyrical offering with `When The Tulips Bloom The War Will End`, which has a slightly off kilter waltz like melody which reminded me of theme music to the early eighties tv series `Tales of the Unexpected`. An ominous but philosophical view on the horrors of warfare.
This long player concludes with `Playing At Being Sad` a final introspective contemplative submission sung over an imaginative melodic backing. It may be an echo on seeing beauty in tragedy.
`Scorched Jerusalem` is an album that I’m sure I’ll have to return to a number of times before I can truly appreciate the many quirks and nuances shared and maybe even then they`ll still be much I’ll have missed.
It’s the kind of record that will take time to seep into your soul but will get there if given enough time.
Rating 8.5/10
