Extremities, Dirt and Various Repressed Emotions saw a return to prominent guitars after the synthesised sound on previous album Outside the Gate. Trouser Press wrote, "Perhaps inspired by all the new industrial bands aping their early style, Killing Joke reformed for a tour, demonstrating new resolve to recapture the old formula", describing it as having "all the intoxicating intensity and righteous fury missing from Outside the Gate mated to a timelier Ministry-like feel." It was recorded shortly after Jaz Coleman's Arabic-influenced album with The Art of Noise's Anne Dudley, Songs from the Victorious City. The riff from "Intravenous" would be reprised on 2006's "Majestic".
Artwork
The eyes on the cover of the album belong to actor Conrad Veidt as featured in the film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. The top pair is original, the other three are upside down, and the cover for the cassette version shows all four pairs original. The back of the CD bears two Latin phrases: the first, "hoc volo, sic iubeo, sit pro ratione voluntas", means: "I wish it, I command it. Let my will take the place of a reason", and was quoted from Roman poet Juvenal; the second, "semper imitatum nunquam idem", means: "always imitated, never replicated".
Release
Extremities, Dirt and Various Repressed Emotions was released in November 1990 by the German label Noise Records. It was re-released on 15 October 2007 by Candlelight Records in three editions: double LP, normal CD and a Deluxe Edition with a CD and a dual disc. "Money Is Not Our God" was the only single released from the album, and failed to chart. The double LP edition features the track "Age of Greed " as a bonus, whereas both CD reissues also feature four tracks from a very rare 1989 cassette demo. One of these tracks, "Jubilation", is actually an early version of "The Beautiful Dead" and had been released previously on a flexi disc. Of the other tracks, only "The Fanatic" was known, having been performed live at several concerts in 1989. The Deluxe Edition featured all bonus tracks on a separate dual disc, with the DVD side containing the music video for "Money Is Not Our God".
Reception
In his retrospective review, Ned Raggett of AllMusic wrote that the album " the sprawling spirit of the early days" of the band.
