Song · Killing Joke
“Empire Song” by Killing Joke
From the album Revelations (1982)
“Empire Song” by Killing Joke appears on 1 radio countdown from 1 station in 1982. It was first released in 1982 on the album Revelations. Its best result is #20 on the John Peel's Festive Fifty of 1982. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #61 alternative song of 1982.
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Killing Joke launched Revelations, their third studio album, with "Empire Song" in March 1982, and strange things were happening around it. The band, singer Jaz Coleman most of all, had sunk deep into the occult and the writings of Aleister Crowley, and that February Coleman decamped to Iceland to ride out an apocalypse he was sure was coming soon.
That left a gap on Top of the Pops: drummer Paul Ferguson took over the vocals while the other three played, and a dummy stood in at a keyboard where Coleman should have been. The song carries a four-way writing credit for Coleman, Ferguson, Geordie Walker and Martin "Youth" Glover, it reached 43 on the UK singles chart that month, and before the year was out Walker and Youth had followed their singer north.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
RockLists rankings
Alternative & Modern Rock
All Rock Formats
Year-end countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1982 | 20 | John Peel (BBC Radio 1) | John Peel's Festive Fifty of 1982 | 50 |
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