KEN Mode – Void (Review)

KEN Mode are a noise rock/hardcore band from Canada and this is their ninth album.

While I really liked 2018’s Loved, 2022’s Null hit harder, and really made KEN Mode an exciting proposition. Apparently I missed out on reviewing Null, (I honestly thought I did), but Void offers an opportunity of sorts to correct that oversight; Void is the companion piece to Null, recorded at the same time, and designed to go together.

So, if Null and Void were created simultaneously, what differentiates them? Well, both albums offer an emotive and affecting form of aggression and atmosphere. However, where Null was devoid of light, but still strove to avoid giving in completely to despair, Void embraces dark oblivion and the siren call of desolation. With a duration of 40 minutes Void is a tad longer too, allowing the band just that little bit more time for the exploration of destructive melancholic anguish.

Void is the sound of the hopelessness and anxiety that you feel in the middle of the night given sonic form. With a core of unhealed pain that’s been left to fester for far too long, Void is raw and intense. It has a heart of hurt, one that covers itself in a filthy spiked sheath of anger. It lashes out indiscriminately, protecting its vulnerable depths, while contributing to the ruinous environment it finds itself in. The songs are damaged, yet lethal predators, stalking their prey with vicious enthusiasm for the kill. All hope may be lost, but there’s catharsis in violence.

Void is a multifaceted experience, for don’t all manifestations of darkness, despair, and hostility have their own textures and flavours? KEN Mode know this well, and mix together a variety of virulent ingredients into their toxic brew, creating something potent and individual. At turns scathingly abrasive or hauntingly harrowing, there’s a world of self-torment and anger spread across this album’s duration. Ripe and ready to explore, you need only delve into Void‘s fathomless depths once before it has you in its claws.

Void is the sort of record that offers listeners many rewards, should they be able to traverse its menacing gloom. For those hardy travellers, this is a record not to miss out on.