Killing Joke’s Jaz Coleman Releases ‘Magna Invocatio-A Gnostic Mass For Choir And Orchestra’

Recorded with Russia’s oldest orchestra, the St Petersburg Philharmonic, this stirring body of work taps into the more melodic, uplifting aspects of the Killing Joke musical canon, using Jaz Coleman’s ongoing journey with this hugely influential UK outfit, something central to his being since later teenage years, as the consummate vehicle for a Gnostic mass (a ritualised celebration of the mysteries of existence).

“I wanted to revisit not just a succession of epiphanies that transformed my own life,” explains Jaz Coleman, “but also to portray some of the more hidden or occulted milestones of the human race that have captured my imagination for some four decades. So I specifically chose an unusual combination of sacred texts that I discovered at different stages throughout my life. The only possible connection between them was that they had the immediate effect of inflaming and lifting my spirits to another level. They are, to coin a phrase, Words of Power!”