KEN Mode – ‘Success’

By Glen Bushell

There are many revivals in music now, and more bands look to the past for inspiration. There’s nothing wrong with that at all, and for the most part they all do it really well. However sometimes, you just want a band to come out and make some good, old-fashioned noise. Thankfully, Canadian trio KEN Mode provide a suitable racket that is uneasy on the ear yet miraculously inviting at the same time. It has taken KEN Mode a while to find this sound, and they have been striving for it over the course of their 15-year career, but they have finally reached their apex with their sixth album ‘Success’.

Glance upon KEN Mode’s social media, and you will see the statement “Are people seriously starting to use grunge as a genre again?” which proves they do not wish to be pigeonholed amongst any sort of revival. They have taken the best parts 90’s alternative rock, soaked it in noise, and with the production techniques of the legendary engineer Steve Albini (Big Black, Shellac) at the helm, created an exciting and original album.

From the disjointed and angular opener ‘Blessed’, you know instantly that you are in for wild ride. It is unhinged and unsettling thanks to being captured live, and in analog by Albini, with no studio enhancements. ‘These Tight Jeans’ then packs a more rhythmic punch, with guest vocals from Jill Clapham going head to head with Jesse Matthewson’s razor-sharp vocal for the unexpectedly catchy chorus.

The delivery in which Matthewson spits his intelligent, honest, and at times sarcastic lyrics is visceral. Even when he gets “romantic” on ‘I Just Liked Fire’ as he declares to his muse “I can’t stop thinking about your skin” he shifts in pitch from a larynx-shredding lower register up to wailing in a similar manner to Justin Pearson (The Locust, Swing Kids, every San Diego band ever) yet perhaps more controlled. KEN Mode even know how to make their noise sound melodic on the revolution summer-esque ‘Management Control’, and can only be likened to what TAD might have sounded like had they jammed with Fugazi (Seriously, sit with that thought for a moment and imagine how good it would have been).

Of course when KEN Mode do best, is just control their chaos. Even when it is at its most jarring on the bass-heavy ‘Failing at Fun Since 1981’, it still contains enough groove running through its core to make it impossible not to bang your head along to the rhythm. The slow-burning ‘A Catalog of Small Disappointment’ sounds straight out of the Touch and Go Records back catalogue, which leads in to the progressive ‘Dead Actors’, which builds until it cannot be restrained anymore before climaxing in a cascade of feedback.

While ‘Success’ is not the easiest of albums to get your head around, those who are familiar with the concept of noise rock should fall in love with this straight away. KEN Mode have used the foundation laid by the iconic Melvins and Big Black, and dragged noise rock kicking and screaming into 2015. It may be bold, and may even be brash at times, but ‘Success’ is the most beautiful 38-minutes of noise you will hear this year.

GLEN BUSHELL

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