Pale Sketcher - Jesu: Pale Sketches Demixed

ARTIST: Pale Sketcher
ALBUM TITLE: Jesu: Pale Sketches Demixed
CATALOG NUMBER: GI-118
LABEL: Ghostly International
FORMAT: CD/Limited LP/Digital
RELEASE DATE: August 24, 2010

01. Don’t Dream It (Mirage Mix)
02. Can I Go Now (Gone Version)
03. Wash It All Away (Cleansed Dub)
04. The Playgrounds Are Empty (Slumber Mix)
05. Tiny Universe (Interstellar)
06. Supple Hope (2009 Mix)
07. Dummy (Bahnhoff Version)
08. Plans That Fade (Faded Dub)
 

For fans of heavy music, Justin K. Broadrick is a household name. After stints in seminal UK grindcore band Napalm Death, industrial/metal outfit Godflesh, and dark dub duo Techno Animal (with Kevin Martin of The Bug / King Midas Sound), Broadrick re-emerged in 2002 as the leader of Jesu, a shoegaze-like metal project. Broadrick’s newest–and, to many purists, most controversial—venture is Pale Sketcher , in which the artist replaces guitars with synthesizers and drums with machines, but maintains his penchant for bleakly beautiful sounds.

Ghostly International is proud to release Jesu: Pale Sketches Demixed, the debut full-length by Justin K. Broadrick's Pale Sketcher alias, on August 24th, 2010.

Pale Sketcher didn’t begin to manifest until the 2007 Jesu release Pale Sketches, which compiled an album’s-worth of tracks that didn’t quite fit the Jesu mold—skeletal, synthesizer-laced compositions that relied more on subtlety and atmosphere than guitar-based sturm und drang. Broadrick continued to tinker with these songs, “de-mixing” them until they barely resembled their originals, forging a sound that was unlike anything in the Broadrick universe.

Interestingly, as Broadrick has moved from more traditional signifiers of heaviness (aggression, guitars, volume) towards their opposites (melancholy, computers, texture) his music has only gotten deeper and more affecting. In that way, Pale Sketcher may be Broadrick’s heaviest work to date.

 --p.a.t.t.