Kreign
III
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When we were pointed to the debut LP by Kreign a few years back (by no less an EBM luminary than Nordvargr) we were quickly impressed by the mix of polish and fury the Phoenix duo already had locked down. Tracks like “5 Layers Of Chaos” and “In That Frame Of Mind” spoke to a keen sense of EBM structures and history running back decades, but with a zip and pep that spoke to both contemporary European body music as well as American industrial club trends of the past decade or so. The band’s second LP, the confusingly titled III, hones in slightly more on the second half of that equation while still staying Kreign’s core course.
Those just joining the party should be taken by opener “Black Bile Emesis”, whose punchy swing and well-sculpted stabbing rhythms bely a fairly stripped down construction. As III unfolds, the anthemic anhalt stomp of much of the debut cedes the spotlight on III to the speedier, more frenetic flurries of “Iniquity” and “Collapse Imminent”. Depending on one’s listening habits these could be linked either to recent left-field EBM from Sweden and Germany, or perhaps a period from decades past when a tighter pool of labels and producers linked European and North American club tracks around slickly produced and immediate EBM programming. Hell, there could be a whiff of the rubbery and burping sampling of the likes of Visitor and Multiple Man on “Dark Triad” if one squints hard enough.
If it’s easy to mistake some of Kreign’s sound as continental, their vocals and thematics feel squarely American, alternating between tight, processed shrieks and droll crooning. The on-the-nose lyrics of “Work Your Body” (“Some like to build muscle mass / Some like to work on cardio-vasc”) bring the japery of Diesel Dudes to mind, but the tune itself is driven by a crawling funk you don’t hear too much in EBM on either side of the Atlantic, save for in tunes like “Disco King” from Kreign’s previous record. The nautical disaster theme of “S.O.S.” is similarly refreshing and direct, with deep sea klaxons accompanying lyrics about struggling to keep your head above the water.
A couple of III‘s tracks run a tad long (somewhat surprising for a record with such a high average BPM), but there’s very little fat on the record in length or overproduction, the latter being especially impressive given the real polish given to every piece of programming in Kreign’s arsenal. Sticking to that sense of curation and editing while still getting the manic energy the band clearly love about EBM is no small feat, and makes III a fresh and entertaining continuation of Kreign’s already solid modus operandi.
