I've a very soft spot for The Fleece having seen many a great show in its "old school" set up. Solid stone walls and floors mean it's the perfect venue for bass heavy slabs of riffage and hence the near perfect setting for Jaz Coleman, Geordie Walker, Youth and Paul Ferguson to test drive tunes from their corking 'Absolute Dissent' album before they set sail across Europe throughout much of October whilst then moving on to America in December.

With no support, and the Fleece website and posters proclaiming "band on early" the wait (pun intended) of nearly two hours that ensued before Killing Joke finally did arrive on stage had one punter near me quipping that "Youth with be Pensioner by the time they get on stage."  At least spirits were high amongst the assembled throng of old school punks, metal heads and extras from 'Battlefield Earth' even if personal hygiene wasn't exactly quite as high on their agendas. 

With the band finally arriving on stage at around 9:30 to the sonic thrust of 'Tomorrow's World' the crystal clear yet bass heavy 'in house' sound immediately shook the sold out crowd (and the building) back into the there and then with an uppercut of aural ferocity.  Fuck this was loud!!!! Jaz Coleman - the jump suited harlequin was immediately pacing the stage edge like the deranged older brother of Manchester fop Ian Brown, and up close it's safe to say "Jaz hasn't aged a bit".  It's also nice to see his other original band mates enjoying themselves, even if a few slight technical gremlins did get a few worried looks exchanged between the smiles as they rushed headlong into 'In Excelsis' from their new album before returning to their classic debut and the sublime 'Wardance'.  This mix of old and new pretty much made up the theme throughout the band's 90-minute set of which highlights included a pumped up version of the band's last single 'European Super State' as well as an unusually quiet Jaz telling Geordie he was not up for talking as "he didn't like Bristol." This was a hilarious quip that could have easily backfired.... and perhaps it did.

As closing down their time onstage with a frantic version of 'Pssyche' the scene was set for the guys to return, but they never did.... leaving the crowd baying for more even though the house lights had long since come back on.

Perhaps Jaz wasn't joking after all?  Who knows? 

Having witnessed Killing Joke live twice before, firstly alienating themselves within an arena full of Motley Crue fans by playing a wall of white post punk noise, and then destroying a field full of festivalgoers by simply playing a 30 minutes greatest hits set, tonight was a weird mixture of the two.  Okay I would have perhaps liked to have heard a few more of the older tunes, but this was always going to be a warm up show, for the 'Absolute Dissent' album, so I'm cool with that.  The world of Jaz Coleman is thankfully never predictable and as a result I'm still sat here collecting my thoughts regarding exactly what I thought of this gig.

But that my uber friend is what live music is all about. Catch Killing Joke on their two UK shows later this month in Edinburgh and London and find out for yourselves exactly what I'm on about.  Confused?  You will be.