We are fast approaching the business end of Euro 2024. A football match streamed from Germany onto the big screen in the Brudenell car park reminds us of the fact. And Julie Christmas is the equivalent of some box-to-box dynamo, all perpetual motion, awesome power, and tireless energy; the sort of player Gareth Southgate could do with right now to fill that rather troublesome vacancy he has in his team’s midfield. The only problems are, Christmas is neither English nor, to the best of my knowledge, a professional footballer. She is an American musician from Brooklyn, New York.
Julie Christmas first burst onto the wider metal scene earlier this millennium as lead vocalist with the dissonant noise-rock band Made Out of Babies. A stint with the post-metal supergroup Battle of Mice ensued before Christmas released her debut solo album The Bad Wife in 2010. 12 days ago and nearly 14 years later she unveiled its follow-up, Ridiculous and Full of Blood.
I’m not quite sure what took her so long, but it was certainly worth the wait. Ridiculous and Full of Blood is a crackerjack of a record, as explosive as it is raw and uncompromising, and Julie Christmas is now over in the UK and Europe with a team of highly creative individuals for a series of dates to promote the new album. Leeds is the opening night of the tour.
An ominous, subterranean drone heralds the entrance of the first five band members onto the stage – Johannes Persson (guitar/vocals), Chris Enriquez (drums), Andrew Schneider (bass), John LaMacchia (guitar), and Tom Tierney (keyboards), all of whom had played on Ridiculous and Full of Blood. Julie Christmas joins them shortly thereafter in a spectacular neon-lit mask and dress which is controlled from a handset held by another woman who is standing just beside us in the crowd. By the time the six musicians have reached the end of an apocalyptic reading of Battle of Mice’s ‘Bones in the Water’ Christmas has removed her headdress and mutated into a Nexus-6 replicant that bears an uncanny resemblance to Darry Hannah’s character in Ridley Scott’s 1982 science fiction classic Blade Runner. You almost expect her to start somersaulting across the Community Room stage.
It is a dystopian vision of what all music will look and sound like in the future. Five songs from Ridiculous and Full of Blood then follow. ‘Thin Skin’, Not Enough’, a truly intoxicating blast of the album’s lead single, ‘Supernatural’, ‘End of the World’, and ‘Ash’. They bring the album to compelling life. Wave upon wave of huge juggernauts of noise, epic metal machines that are magnified by the dramatic lighting, Christmas’s powerful stage presence and the fierce, corrosive quality of her high-octane vocals. It becomes a transformative experience played out at ear-splitting levels.
Julie Christmas steps back in time to ‘Secrets All Men Keep (Salt Bridge, Part II)’ from her debut album before fast-forwarding to the present day and a return to Ridiculous and Full of Blood by way of ‘Blast.’ Much like Blade Runner before her, Christmas and her collaborators create a timeline through their music that captures a landscape of dark shadows and reflected neon light. But unlike that film which is populated by genetically-designed human beings devoid of emotion, Christmas’s words explore the complexities of the human condition. She climbs inside these songs, living and breathing every single word, perhaps no more so than with the emotional intensity of ‘The Lighthouse.’ And in amongst this often brutal yet strangely melodic onslaught of noise, it is this strong feeling of empathy that leaves us connected entirely to the music and the occasion.
Photos: Simon Godley
More photos of Julie Christmas at Brudenell Social Club
