Playing to Extremes: Jesu

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LATELY, METAL BANDS are pretty hard up for blasphemous names. So it's astonishing Justin Broadrick snagged "Jesu" before some headbangers did.

"People realize it's not a heavy metal group," says the former member of death-metal pioneers Napalm Death and Godflesh of his newer, dreamier project. "But it's still heavy. And there's still metal in there. I love the sound of gut-wrenching guitars — painful, but with beautiful melodies."

Over 20-plus years hopscotching genres, what unified the grindcore of Napalm Death with the electronica of Techno Animal was Broadrick's love of extreme noise.

Given all that, the melodic richness of Jesu comes as a surprise.

"I got quite tired of just playing brutal music, you know?" says Broadrick. "Emotionally, I felt I'd matured a bit past the angst I had when I was 19 years old."

This newfond maturity could be misleading. What if people think, "Oh, Justin Broadrick does such pretty music?"

"I actually like that aspect. That I'm making music that's quite clearly more sensitive than Godflesh," he says.

"My first musical love was punk, stuff like Crass or Discharge. But simultaneously, my parents had a vast range of musical taste — Zeppelin to Krautrock to singer-songwriter stuff. They were big fans of Brian Eno."

Kiss your metal cred goodbye, Justin.

"Oh, yeah, my first big songwriting influence was Red House Painters. And the songs of Mark Kozelek generally," meaning the man who alchemically transmuted AC/DC's stinging hard rock into poignant acoustic ballads.

But the final nail in the credibility coffin?

"Husker Du. Everyone says 'Landspeed Record,'" — that band's attempt to make the loudest, fastest album of their day. "But I love 'Warehouse,'" the Huskers' slick swan song.

"I'm always enamored with bands who come from hardcore roots and then turn to writing proper songs," says Broadrick. "I'm trying to abbreviate my life to date into one band."

He laughs, "It's a long road."

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Written by Express contributor Bob Massey

Photo by Tina Korhonen