KEN mode - Loved

Sludgy Canadian hardcore oddballs KEN mode continue to ride the wave of underground acclaim generated by their past three albums onto their seventh full-length here, Loved. And for the most part on Loved, the band sprinkle just a little bit of their own modern, slightly sludgier flair onto the classic metalcore blueprint laid out by Converge, not really including much of the experimental noise that helped set them apart from the crowd on albums like Venerable. Loved, on the other hand, for the majority of its runtime sounds like a slightly more heavily produced Converge, but not as intricately woven or as furiously performed.
The first two thirds of the album aren’t really that eventful or surprising for the most part. The opening track, “Doesn’t Feel Pain Like He Should”, features a pretty comprehensive overview of what most of the album is comprised of: sludgy down-tuned and dissonant guitar riffage, clang-y bass, and ferocious shouts, and unyielding drum battery all wrapped up in a familiar metallic hardcore package. “The Illusion of Dignity” is one of the highlights on the first half of album though, with its particularly crunchy bass line and eccentric horn outro well-arranged in a fiery display of KEN mode’s strengths. “This Is a Love Test” breaks up the homogeneity seven tracks in with a more ominous and tense delivery supplemented by an eerie saxophone support in the background.
The album’s final third (its last two songs) show the band at their most characteristically ambitious. The frantic and even slightly emotive “Fractures in Adults” features some of the most unique and most well-arranged guitar work on the album. The eight-and-a-half-minute “No Gentle Art” takes its sweet and appropriate time to build a compounding closer for the album. Angry but contained in its first minutes, the track gradually ascends to a full-on verbal and instrumental assault, with even a chaotic saxophone part contributing a highlight portion to the song’s cultivated madness. These last two tracks truly make it seem like the band simply went on hardcore autopilot for the first seven, and really provide a window into the potential that KEN mode had with this album if they had pursued the type of unique, experimental hardcore that made the closing moments so exciting rather than the well-established, run-of-the-mill hardcore that embodies the majority of the album.
As strong as the note that Loved ends on is, I really was hoping for more from this album considering what KEN mode have done on previous releases. It’s still a highly capable and somewhat unique addition to the metallic hardcore landscape this year, but it’s not enough to put KEN mode in the upper echelons they should be in.

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