K L P S

KLPS were previously known as KOLLAPS\E and released some promising work with their abrasive brand of post-metal over the last couple of years. Though the band name has been modified, the Swedes retain their relentlessly pounding, heavy imaginations of post-civilisation soundscapes. As previously, the music is violently uncompromising with elements of post-sludge and harsh, towering post-metal riffs.

The opener SUBVERSE is a statement of intent with a savage amalgamation of Meshuggah’s staccato mechanization and Cult of Luna’s looser widescreen emotional depth. The screamed visceral vocals are sandblasting and inexorable throughout the record. KLPS are heavy too - planetary, crushing heavy - and KATARSIS easily challenges the tectonic gravity of Neurosis in terms of monumentalist, mountainous volume. They can also veer into discordance with the jarring bleakness of TRIBULATION, a ten minute dissonant Judgement Day meditation or the ugly primordial crawling lurch of NATTSVART and UNDERTOW.

Wisely, though, KLPS don’t rely purely on blunt force and circular, elemental pummelling. Some of the record’s most compelling sections are passages of delicate lull where quieter brooding post-catastrophic event hush are every bit as impactful and arresting as the crescendos and crashing rises. All too often loud, noisy bands add quiet sections into tracks purely as bridge links between the loud noisy parts of a song. But here, these subdued sections are handled adroitly and woven with care into the record, enunciating a multi-dimensional emotional weight to the KLPS sound. The band also have a flair for towering, serene, high altitude post-rock riffs imbuing the record with width and height. These are areas the band could possibly explore or experiment with further in the future.

This record belies a sense of a band that have developed greater confidence and matured focus. They seem comfortable rather than laboured in longer, meditative tracks and unhurried structures that retain their clamp on the listener despite their juggernaut run-times. This band are still relatively new, but they have not only refined their sound but asserted greater ownership of it. They are still relentlessly pounding and the vividly bleak dystopian atmospheres they create are unforgiving, colossal and truly gripping. They have absorbed obvious elements of the post-metal giants like Neurosis, Cult of Luna, Isis etc but given their strident trajectory thus far, they could realistically be approaching competitor status.

K L P S is available via These Hands Melt and here on bandcamp: https:kollapsemusic.bandcamp.com