Thirty-five years ago, English post-punk icons Killing Joke released one of their most incendiary and abrasive records, Extremities, Dirt and Various Repressed Emotions. The record sounded nothing like its predecessor Outside The Gate and stands apart from the band’s subsequent 90s releases Pandemonium (from 1994) and Democracy (from 1996).
The several-decades-long story of Killing Joke includes many turbulent times, but the moment that drummer Martin Atkins joined the band in the late 80s came at a particularly difficult period in the band’s history (the band’s oft-maligned Outside The Gate seeing the at-the-time stable rhythm section of Paul Ferguson and Paul Raven exiting the band).
Already having made a name for himself as a part of Public Image Limited, Martin Atkins would go on to further cement his status as an industrial/post-punk legend in bands like Pigface and Ministry. Extremities, Dirt and Various Repressed Emotions would prove to be his sole studio album with Killing Joke, but a record of great significance for the band (and the many other artists it’s gone on to influence) and an experience of great significance to the drummer.
In the years since the album’s original release, the world has lost both Paul Raven (who returned to Killing Joke to play on Extremities) and more recently, guitarist Geordie Walker (whose singular style played a huge part in giving the band their unique sonic identity in all their many phases).
Having opened Chicago’s Museum of Post Punk and Industrial Music in 2021, Atkins found himself drawn back into his time in Killing Joke. With the 35-year anniversary approaching, a decision was made to bring this album back to life on stage. Martin Atkins Presents: Killing Joke’s Extremities sees the drummer bring together an all-star-underground cast, including Randy Blythe of Lamb of God and Deaf Club’s Justin Pearson, to perform the album in its entirety for the first time in 33 years at Reggie’s in Chicago, IL on November 28 and 29.
New Noise caught up with Atkins to discuss the forthcoming show, recall his time in the band, and honor the memory of his fallen comrades.
What was your first exposure to the music of Killing Joke?
Me and Jah Wobble were on time for the recording session for his Betrayal album at Gooseberry studios—a dub joint in Soho—Killing Joke were running late, so we went and got some Chinese food to pass the time. My girlfriend for a while, Bethan Peters from Delta 5, introduced me to Youth at a gig at The Clarendon—maybe 1980? The music was all over London back then—at least in the places we went—the Music Machine, the Rock Garden, and the pubs
How was the idea introduced that you might join the band?
Ha! Geordie called me one day—I wasn’t doing much after my five years in and out of PiL, and I jumped at the chance to get on a plane. Little did I know what I was walking into!
I’m one of those strange birds that actually likes Outside the Gate a lot, but I recognize that at that poin, Killing Joke as a band was falling to pieces. How did you find Jaz and Geordie to work with when you first started playing together? How much did you feel like you were in a unified band?
I spent a week or so believing I had joined THE Killing Joke—Then it became obvious that yes everything was falling apart. The response to OTG was bad bad bad (it was a Jaz solo album of midi keyboards released as Killing Joke as the only way the label could get their money back, with no regard for the damage to the brand/band.) I started to manage the band as best I could and generate some money and momentum. And, as far as a unified band—It was just Jaz and Geordie and a temp bass player followed by a better one (Dave “Taif” Ball) and a hired keyboard player at that time. It was a mess. Glorious, but a mess.
What stands out from those first live shows you had together, and how did new material start to get integrated into your shows?
Well, damn, it was Killing Joke—The fans were different and serious! The beats, Big Pauls beats, took me to another level after PiL—more tribal and a physical workout for sure. I LOVED playing those songs, those early songs—what a fucking catalogue of underground anthemic hits! Wonderful. We had rehearsals constantly and started to work on new songs—especially after my tour with Ministry. I decided that we had to accelerate to reclaim the place that KJ owned. Geordie was down, and for a while it seemed like the two of us vs. Jaz.
We kept playing and working on new songs; Geordie was living in Detroit and, frustrated with faxes and constant ballads on cassette from Jaz, we went into Steve Albini’s studio on Francisco Street and made six demos that ended up being the backbone of Extremities. We sent the tape to Jaz and said, “THIS is what we are doing”. We started to work new songs into the set, and practice and practice and pots of tea and more gigs—eventually Paul Raven heard what was going on and came back to rejoin. It was a MOMENT for sure, a ripple around London, and dovetailed into recording the album.
Extremities, Dirt and Various Repressed Emotions has given me joy for many years, but it’s certainly a savage, aggressive-sounding record. I don’t know how much joy there would have been making it. What was the atmosphere like making the record, and what were your overriding feelings during that time?
Strange, I felt like I was defending Killing Joke from Jaz and middle-of-the-road mediocrity? And the echoes of OTG (sorry man!) sounds weird, but that’s what it felt like. It’s only in this last year that I’ve actually listened to what we all did and gained a new respect for each part of it. I think at the time I was too clenched into a fist, ready for trouble and confrontation, that it was difficult to look at this as a musical work—It was a fucking knife fight.
Killing Joke have had so many stylistic shifts over the years, but Extremities is arguably the biggest shift the band ever had. It’s also the only Killing Joke record you were a part of. How do you see your contributions shaping the direction the record ultimately took?
I mean, you said that. I should let that stand. From the beats to the lyrics and arrangements and subject matter, the inclusion of John Bechdel, the ‘tender juicy steak’ commercial the re writing of the Age Of Greed lyrics (with the band) to pull it away from a diatribe about the value proposition of first class air travel !!! and into the world that we and our fans were actually in. the ferocity. The Ministry tour of the U.S. was a fucking watershed moment, and I was determined that Killing Joke would not be lost at sea. As you said, my contributions shaped the direction the record ultimately took
Jaz Coleman is no stranger to suddenly disembarking from the Killing Joke train. How do you remember his leaving, your time in the band ending and the subsequent formation of Murder Inc.?
He didn’t leave when I was in the band—but, throughout the tour we had during the Gulf War, he was reserving flights and ready to ditch us at a moments’ notice. Kind of couldn’t believe it tbh. The budget only worked for the whole tour when we did the last two London dates—out of desperation (and disbelief) I called Chris Connelly and asked him to learn 12 songs from the set and be prepared to jump on a plane to help us get through the last few dates if Jaz left us. I think Jaz sowed the seeds for Murder Inc. himself and my departure right there.
After the first Pigface dates where we played six hours at times and spent time chatting with the crowd in the lines outside—Killing Jokes more distant attitude to their audience started to grate on me—I was constantly begging for us to do two more songs for the small crowd who had stood in the rain in Philadelphia on a Tuesday night. It was just too much all the time. So, I quit. We had a tremendous show in London, and I walked off stage for the last time, handing my brass snare to my drum tech Bart Flores.
Geordie Walker is probably my favorite guitarist. Totally unique, in my opinion, and a huge loss to the world. Can you share a Geordie story from your time together with him?
Oh, Geordie was something else, and one of mine too—I was best man at his wedding. He was so fucking funny and so totally connected to his guitar—so effortlessly mesmerizing. so all about the music.
I quote him all of the time in the studio: “Feature it or fuck it!” he would say—massive advice to live by. We did so much together—all of his work outside of Killing Joke, I think? Murder Inc. and the Damage Manual.
How did the idea of Martin Atkins Presents: Killing Joke’s Extremities first come about?
That’s more difficult to nail down … A feeling first? Being surrounded by those memories at the museum, playing my drums again after a hip replacement and almost dying … starting to get fit … realizing that the 35th anniversary of the album was coming up, the connections to Chicago and right across the street from Reggie’s is where the invisible records loft used to be where we rehearsed and where I printed the “Money Is Not Our God” backdrops for the video shot by H Gun … listening to the album in a curious state of mind, crying as that direct portal opened up to the past—I listened some more then played some beats then it got worse honestly—kind of like muscle memory combined with memory memory ?
I think I fractured a finger, and I cried some more—not from the finger—thats part of my drumming—from the emotions. I played some parts of some of the beats, called Danny Carey to ask how the fuck he does it, and he told me he plays along to Extremities to warm up for tool sometimes. Well, OK! Then I started to investigate if Reggie’s would be into a three-day run and what that would look like, and then I started to put it together (partially) and also let it put itself together (if that makes sense?) There is a WAY of these things. I started to think about what it could be, how it could be a celebration of it. I spoke with Geordie’s first wife Ginny and told Jaz what I was doing. Then I sat for a bit.
How did the lineup for the show come together?
I emailed Randy to ask if he was familiar with Killing Joke. He sent me back a picture of the chapter in his new book Money Is Not Our God—boom.
Then a few others, Greta Brinkman came over from Germany to help with rehearsals on bass and then Justin Pearson, Tara Busch and Orville Kline slotted into place … I asked Steve Silver to speak a little—he allegedly tour managed us in this period and I love his stories. Did Tara suggest Nicola from adult? or Justin? I don’t remember. I met up with Dai who had rapped informally at my most favorite Pigface show in 2019 … She helped solidify a different approach for Termite Mound thats helped me think in larger terms:
Stage 1 – replicate the songs
Stage 2 – replicate the ideas and the emotions
Stage 3 – celebrate the fuck out of all of it
So now, trumpet, solo trumpet, perhaps a choir, cello from Layla Royale—Who knows. To be correct, I contacted Jaz—not to ask for permission but to invite him if he wants to be any kind of a part of it. I have no expectation that that will happen—but I wanted to be sensitive to the forces set in motion and the consequences and ripples of all of it. It is not simple—but, underneath it all, it kind of is?
At a stop light after an exchange with Jaz’s management I looked up—The license plate of the car in front of me K WALKER. In the supercharged world of Killing Joke that isn’t a sign— Its permission.
What can people expect at the show?
Oh fuck. Not sure I know what I can expect. A fucking kick in the chest, a hand around your heart, smiling, triumphant smiling, tears, of course, of joy and for those that are no longer with us, but that their spirits are celebrated in the most respectful way—and blood, there will be blood.
Weird how a wave goodbye turned into a re connection to it all?
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