“Will you inherit my grief, if I finally choose to sleep?”
It’s been five whole years since Knocked Loose’s last LP, A Different Shade of Blue, shook the scene for a second time following 2016’s now-iconic Laugh Tracks. Both records, along with 2021’s barnburner EP, A Tear in the Fabric of Life, have now firmly cemented themselves in scene history. It’s clear to see how, too, as with each release, the Kentucky unit have iterated on their sound in increasingly meaningful and intentioned ways. Throughout the years, the group’s soundscape has turned more fierce; more brooding – and certainly more aggressive. This notion was bolstered on their 2023 Upon Loss singles, but is no more apparent than on their latest offering in You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To – a record that seeks to up the ante and every possible turn, and manages to stick the landing each and every time.
The intent is clear from the moment You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To begins with “Thirst”, until the very moment it reaches its haunting conclusion in “Sit & Mourn”. This is a dark record – at times overwhelmingly so – and a dense one to boot. A record that has no concept of punch-pulling, this ten-track, 27-minute endeavour may not seem like the behemoth that lays below its surface upon first glance, but once you get stuck into the record’s dense, pacey ebb and flow, you will begin to see it for its true nature.
Beyond its belligerent and daunting opening number, You Won’t Go Until You’re Supposed To offers up highlight after highlight as it bobs and weaves through its many equally chaotic and primally groovy soundscapes. Singles “Suffocate” (featuring the genre-defiant Poppy), “Don’t Reach For Me” and “Blinding Faith” prove some of the record’s most viscerally aggressive at each end of the record’s run, followed by the likes of the dense and violent sub-minute rager “Moss Covers All” and, of course, “Slaughterhouse 2” toward the album’s midpoint.
The latter of those last two will surely prove to be a fan favourite in the coming weeks, months and years, as vocalist Bryan Garris’ trade-off with Motionless In White’s Chris Motionless is an unexpected match made in heaven. All of these tracks help define the broader soundscape of the record, and set it apart through this visceral sense of urgency and tangible hatred. There is nary a moment wasted across these tracks, with each unwieldy riff and piece of pummeling percussion feels placed exactly where they are meant to be.
It helps, too, particularly for the album’s pacing, as each track contains some form of smooth transition to help sell that this is truly an album experience. There is a clever balance that Knocked Loose have had to strike here in its pacing – to find the perfect midpoint between crafting a soundscape as oppressive and unwavering as this, all the while ensuring that it’s still consistently impactful and interesting to listen to. These transitions often give (albeit very brief) glimpses of reprieve amongst the chaos, and help to craft a greater sense that you’re digesting a narrative; an intentioned and natural structure amidst all the noise. It’s unrelenting, but it provides an energetic push and pull that works wonders for the cohesion of the listening experience
Even through its unyielding ferocity, however, You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To keeps you guessing. Mid-album cut “Take Me Home” is an oppressive display, weaving a slowly crescendoing tapestry of disconcerting tension. Unlike many of the key moments across Knocked Loose’s career, though, there is no sense of relief of that tension – no point in which this exponential build culminates in a big moment – it’s simply there to create an atmosphere of unease, and it does so masterfully.
Another curveball presented is the industrialised “The Calm That Keeps You Awake” – a track that takes the primal, groovy nature of many of the tracks on display here, and recontextualizes it into something I’ve not heard the band lean into before. The trappings of a typical Knocked Loose affair still remain in its ballistic fury and planet-sized breakdowns, but the lead motif and pulsating instrumental hook that returns throughout this song feels closer to an industrial metal soundscape, with some tasteful nu-metal ambience to provide texture.
Closer “Sit & Mourn” also left me with my jaw firmly on the floor, as its hauntingly beautiful nature provides a stark and welcome juxtaposition to the unrelenting heaviness on display otherwise. That’s not to say “Sit & Mourn” isn’t a heavy number – by all accounts it certainly is – but it’s the way in which it applies its harsher moments alongside its more melodic and ambient aspects that ultimately lead to a closing stretch that makes it feel as though the air has been sucked out of the room, in brilliant and daunting fashion. It’s a truly remarkable closer, and stands not only as one of their most bold and left-field songs to date, but also the first song out of Knocked Loose’s discography to make me cry upon first listen.
Through each listen, I’m continually uncovering new textures and tones across this overwhelmingly dense behemoth, and while at present it’s certainly evident to me that You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To is nothing short of stellar, I believe this is a record that will only grow on myself and others over time as each layer of this intricately crafted piece is slowly uncovered. From end to end, this may just be Knocked Loose’s opus – a confident display of the band’s most chaotic and forward-thinking songwriting to date, all contained in a tight and unwavering package of ferocity and violence.
9.5/10
You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To is due out May 10th via Pure Noise Records, and you can find pre-orders for the record here.