KEN Mode Jar Minds With ‘Batholith’

In the early '90s, as alternative rock bands like Nirvana and Soundgarden took over the cultural zeitgest with abrasive force, an even more contentious counter-culture of metallic noise bands emerged that were less melodic and more confrontational, including Jesus Lizard, God Bullies, Unsane and Surgury. Winnipeg, Manitoba trio KEN Mode suck up the skewed energy of that subculture and regurgitate it for the modern era.

The Canadian band's upcoming third full-length, 'Venerable,' comes out March 15 and features the jarring, angular 'Batholith,' which Noisecreep is proud to premiere as a taster for the ferocious record.

Listen to 'Batholith'

"Batholith was written in the second half of the writing process for the album," KEN Mode vocalist and guitarist Jesse Matthewson told Noisecreep. "We finished it up in the fall of 2009. I don't think we were specifically setting out to write something that stood out when compared to the rest of the material. But I suppose by the time we were writing the second half of the album, every song was approached [that way] to a certain extent. We just wanted this song to be something you could stomp your foot to and sing along at times."

The lyrics for 'Batholith are as fierce as the music. "It's about the cold, miserable routines that dictate our daily lives and how we attempt to cope with them," Matthewson said.

KEN Mode started writing songs for 'Venerable' in May 2009, and in no time they had written 'Book of Muscle,' 'Mako Shark,' 'A Wicked Pile' and a rough version of 'Irate Jumbuck.'

"I originally thought we had a full album nearly finished mid-way through 2009," Matthewson said of the writing process which started out smooth, but got progressively more complicated. "We whittled those ideas down and ended up actually finishing the material in July of 2010. [And by that time, we felt we] got the creative juices flowing to a satisfactory level."

In anticipation of the release of 'Venerable' KEN Mode are offering free downloads of 2006's 'Reprisal' and 2008's 'Mennonite.'

Buy KEN Mode Albums