Young Knives – Barbarians (2020)
Hailing from Oxford, UK, Mercury Prize-nominated band Young Knives return with there new album Barbarians. It has been seven years since the release of their last album Sick Octave and Barbarians was released September 18th 2020.
The first track ‘Swarm’ starts with 80’s sounding synths and has an eerie yet powerful sound. The vocals are layered over instrumentation singing: “I can feel the heartbeat of the swarm”. It then kicks into the full band and it’s a good rock sound with great drum techniques. The eerie sounds continue throughout the song along with electronic vocals; it’s very catchy.
The track ‘Society For Cutting Up Men’ has great guitar riffs at the start, then a heavy bassline kicks in and is amazing. The lyrics and vocals are great and it has a very catchy 80’s sound. The track ‘Jenny Haniver’ starts with a great twangy sound of synths that carries on throughout the song, again with that awesome 80’s sound. The vocals are nice and gentle, it has a good drumbeat and it has great guitar riffs too.
‘Red Cherries’ starts with a drum intro, vocals kick in and the track is very unusual sounding when it all kicks in, which isn’t a bad thing. ‘Red Cherries’ is very unique and it has some heavy rock sounds in there as well as electro. The track ‘I Am Awake’ has a very soft rock sound. It has epic synth sounds and sounds like an 80’s sci-fi movie theme song. The great bassline and slow drumbeat make it very soothing.
The track ‘Barbarians’ starts with voices that sound like they’re bickering that is quite amusing; then an extremely epic bassline kicks in with some great vocals. It has interesting lyrics and a catchy sound all the way through.
If you are a fan of 80’s rock, then all of this album is definitely for you. Overall, the ten tracks have everything from epic basslines to outstanding vocals and are worth checking out.
For more from Young Knives, check out their Facebook, SoundCloud and YouTube. Videos have been released for ‘Society for Cutting Up Men’ and ‘Sheep Tick’.
