Album a Day: Laibach - Jesus Christ Superstars

Laibach
Mute
(1996)

Given that legendary industrial group Laibach's first album, 1985's self-titled Laibach, featured a damn dying on a cross (or a plus sign given the proportionate horizontal and vertical components) it seems like it was only a matter of time before the band would produce an entirely religiously themed (primarily Christian) album. Though it would take eleven more years to get there, 1996 gave way to Jesus Christ Superstars. This particular album would go down as one of the more raw, guitar-driven albums in the band's discography, more reminiscent of Oomph! than their previous work, which, while always heavy, for a long time tended to lean more on the electronic side.

There was a bit of irony there given that the first track on the album is a cover of Juno Reactor's "God is God". Though with Laibach nothing is accidental, and what would be even odder than the slight change in musical direction is that first song. Laibach had been and continues to be long-known for their various covers, often re-purposing songs for their own agenda, and this CD contains three covers (again, not unusual for the band) with the Juno Reactor song, "Jesus Christ Superstar" from Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's rock opera of the same name, and a cover of Prince's "The Cross" from his first solo album Sign O' The Times. What would be so strange about the inclusion of "God is God" is that the song hadn't been released by Juno Reactor yet and wouldn't see a release until the single released a year later in 1997 and on the full-length Bible of Dreams (also released in 1997). However, if you check the liner notes of the Jesus Christ Superstars (again, a great reason for having physical over digital) you'll see the musical writing credit given to Ben Watkins and Nick Burton of Juno Reactor and on the last page of the booklet there is a note that says, "The original version of "God is God" is taken from the forthcoming Juno Reactor album and single on Blue Room Released." I personally just find that pretty amazing and I'm surprised that I think that that particular tidbit has been somewhat forgotten by time and I've even seen credit given first to Laibach in various places.

The song "God is God" itself is a fantastic cover that takes a primarily electronic/tribal piece and makes it into a typically-Laibach epic. What works so well for this and many of the songs on the album is a mix of the sweepingly dramatic performances of Laibach and booming/commanding vocals. Its a really great contrast to the original even though both resonate for different reasons. I'd even go so far so say the Juno Reactor version has a sort of removed, passive quality that allows the listener to float around in the ether and transcend to another state of reality or plane of existence. Laibach's version is much more engaging, fear-mongering, and earthly.

The second cover on the album is perhaps just as fantastic, a re-imagining of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's "Jesus Christ Superstar". Of course this song is sort of a centerpiece for the album, with only the addition of an "s" standing between the name of the song and the name of the album. Laibach has a great piece written up on their website about the album and in referencing their choice to cover this song they mention how the original (a mirroring of John's Lennon's quote about The Beatles being bigger than Jesus) "...cast a clean-cut Jim Morrison type as Christ and played out his story against the peace concerns the Vietnam war period. That its social impact outweighed its musical value could be ascribed to its meeting the religious needs of an audience unsatisfied by conventional religions. Laibach use it today as a vehicle to explore the way rock had absorbed Hollywood's idea of Christian values."

I won't detail every song but the rest of the album and every one of the original tracks are equally as good as the covers. Even for an industrial album there's still plenty of diversity on this album with more traditionally Laibach songs like "Kingdom of God" and "Abuse and Confession" which, like many of the songs on the album, features these really solid orchestral parts that only enhances their already epic nature, to heavier songs like "Declaration of Freedom" and "Message From The Black Star" that are much more in the style of Neue Deutsche Härte (new German hardness) that was typical at the time of bands like Oomph!, Hanzel und Gretyl (though an American band), Umbra et Imago, and the emerging Rammstein.

Personally one of my favorite tracks on the CD is a much more minimalist song towards the end of the album named "To The Night Light" which feels much more in-line with early Laibach. I think this song (certainly amongst others in their discography) shows a more artistically-driven side of Laibach where they are truly one of the more masterful bands in Industrial at controlling atmosphere and mood, driving it towards a very dark place.

The roots of Industrial music generally centered around the challenging of ideas, musical forms, convention, etc. By 1996 there had been a boom in Industrial and while some bands such as KMFDM, Pigface, and the disintegrating Skinny Puppy were still behind that there were a number of bands emerging that simply just wanted to make angry pop music. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, however, I just thinks its refreshing that Laibach was and continues to be a band that subverts, questions, and thinks during its process, even though they could rest on their laurels of simply being a fantastic, aggressive band. Here Laibach takes on the major theme of religion. The Goth/Industrial scene is not one that is typically associated with deep religious belief so the emergence of such an album is not necessarily controversial, nor do I think it intends to be. The band has stated that with this album they hoped to raise more questions than give answers. Though of course doing an album like this, one does have to wonder Laibach's stance on religion. Is this a question of all religion, Christianity, organized-religion, D. none of the above? The aforementioned article has a quote from the band that I think perhaps sums up the whole thing, "Yes, we believe in God, but unlike Americans we do not trust him."

Favorite Tracks: God is God, Jesus Christ Superstar, Kingdom of God, Abuse and Confession, Message From The Black Star, and To The New Light

http://www.laibach.nsk.si/