Since the release of their self-titled debut album in 2002 through Prank Records, Georgia’s Kylesa have been progressing continuously, slowly distancing themselves from their hardcore-punk roots and embracing a more progressive and psychedelic sound. So you won’t be surprised if I told you that the new album ‘Ultraviolet’ is another step towards that direction. Their previous effort ‘Spiral Shadow’ released three years ago really marked a new era for this ever-evolving band, pushing their previously reserved elements of dark psychedelia and indie-rock to the fore of their punk-sludge combustion and this new album continues in the same vein, but reveals an even greater emphasis on those psychedelic, goth and indie-rock textures.
Kylesa have toned down the volume and intensity of their sludge monolithic heaviness and worked hard to craft a structured and layered piece of work deeply immersed in a cathartic and dark atmosphere. Even some of the rocking tunes like ‘Unspoken’ or the heavy ‘Vulture’s Landing’ have a haunting, sombre ambience to them.
Vocally, Kylesa also demonstrate a noteworthy evolution with guitarist Laura Pleasents gaining a greater role in this department, singing in a more dreamlike tone like a spiritual voice guiding you to all things cosmic and dreamy.
It is clear that a lot of effort has been put into the composition of the new songs, as each one of them show a high number of different levels and layers. You get trippy noises, electronic swirls and lulling ambient sounds. It's clearly an album for a headphones listening experience rather than an album that you can crank up on a noisy and smoky club.

Band info: www.facebook.com/KYLESAmusic
Label info: www.season-of-mist.com

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Genre-defying southern quintet Kylesa have recently revealed a brand new song from their forthcoming album “Ultraviolet”, which is slated for release on 24 May via Season Of Mist.
The band have already dropped two tracks from this new effort this year, namely ‘Unspoken’ and ‘Quicksand’ and now with ‘Vulture’s Landing’ they offer fans another mesmerising peek into the sonic world of “Ultraviolet”. Pre-orders of the album are available at Season of Mist shop here.
Check out the track below.

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Savannah-based quintet Kylesa is set to release a new album entitled "Ultraviolet", on May 24 in Europe and May 28 in North America via Season Of Mist. The follow-up to "Spiral Shadow" was recorded at The Jam Room in Columbia, South Carolina, with the band's guitar player/songwriter and sought-after producer, Phillip Cope (Baroness, Black Tusk), once again overseeing production.
"Whereas 'Spiral Shadow' was a warm album suggesting concepts of hope, 'Ultraviolet' is a bit colder and darker," explains Kylesa songwriter/guitar player Laura Pleasants. "All of our studio albums have their own unique identity and we've always been a band who strives for something different than what current fads suggest. With 'Ultraviolet', we took a step inward and wrote music that we felt we had to write; this album centers around the multiple themes of loss and you can feel it in the music. Everyone goes through it during their lifetime and this record reflects that experience."
"Unspoken", a new song from the eleven-track album, is available now for streaming below. 

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Santiago Alquimista - Lisbon 

19/01/2012

  

Although tonight’s show isn’t exactly crowded, the excitement surrounding these shows is clear to see on the faces of the few ones that decided to go down to Santiago Alquimista and watch psychedelic rockers Kylesa in action. After all, not only this is the band’s first time in Lisbon, they’ve also brought with them two enthralling and distinct groups, Ken Mode and Circle Takes the Square, as support acts.

The evening starts with the Canadians Ken Mode, who delve straight into the belligerent and compelling sounds of “Obeying The Iron Will...” from their latest effort “Venerable”. The three-piece play their entire set with the lights out, which helps create a dark and mysterious ambience that totally complements their intense and emotional charged performance. It’s a great shame that a large portion of tonight’s crowd is acting with indifference towards this talented bunch.

Second up are Circle Takes the Square, who are a guitarist short tonight, but play a fierce and highly convincing show nonetheless. At times bordering Today is the Day levels of frenzied volume, the band engages in an experimental melange of raucous punk, abrasive noise and rapid-fire blasts of grind throughout nearly 40-minutes. Their set is divided between rabid numbers like “Crowquill” and “In the Nervous Light of Sunday” from their debut album “As the Roots Undo” and schizophrenic and plain puzzling songs like “Way Of Ever-Branching Paths” from their recent EP “Decompositions - Vol I”.

Next is Kylesa, and the crowd goes loud when the band walks into the stage to perform “Said and Done” from their mind-blowing album “Static Tensions”. Despite a few problems in the vocal department, the five-piece are on glorious form tonight playing all the crowd-pleasing tunes like “Tired Climb”, “To Forget” and “Unknown Awareness”. Phillip Cope and Co. doesn’t do much in the way of audience interaction, but that doesn’t seem to irk the crowd, who shows their appreciation for every song very loudly.



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Kylesa have been hitting the road pretty damned hard in the last few years, having toured with a number of bands such as Amebix, High on Fire, The Ocean, Withered, Lair of The Minotaur, Baroness, and The Hidden Hand between many others.
Right now, the band is sitting at home preparing to go on tour with Mastodon and Intronaut to promote their recently released fourth work “Static Tensions”, which has been unanimously touted in most magazines as the band’s best work so far. I’d say that things look extremely promising for the Savannah’s quintet right now.
When we approached guitarist and vocalist Laura Pleasants through e-mail to know more about “Static Tensions”, we eventually had to enquire about the current mood inside the Kylesa camp after hearing about the rapturous acclaim the new album is garnering and all the positive things that are about to happen?

“Things are quite busy with Kylesa right now. Quite good as well! We recently came home from a run of the south east with Skeletonwitch and BlackTusk. We leave on Friday for the Mastodon tour, so we're practicing and finishing things up around here before we go.”

With the music industry undergoing through such wrecking times, touring and playing gigs is now more important than ever, especially for any band that wish to build a career with some durability. Is that something you all enjoy doing, seeing that you’re not completely tired of packing all your gear into a van and drive to all sorts of places or would you rather be sitting at home more often, writing and recording?

“We've always been a touring band and I think overall that's how we've gained our fans. We've never had a "hype machine" or much money behind us so we've had to do a lot of the leg work on our own. We do enjoy touring but it has its ups and downs for sure. I really enjoy writing and recording but after being home for several months, I get the itch to go on the road again. I love to travel and I love meeting new people, and playing live is something I really gain from.”

With such hectic touring activities throughout the last few years, Kylesa must have some interesting and amusing stories that happened previously on tour, do you care to share any with us?

“Generally, what happens on the road stays on the road! That's the best rule of thumb. We've had lots of funny, weird, and crazy experiences that will probably surface one day in form of a DVD or book.”

Not only Kylesa’s music should be experienced live it should also be heard on record and their latest release “Static Tensions” is starting to get some serious appraisal from well-known magazines like Decibel, Rock Sound and Metal Hammer.
The new album is by far Kylesa’s most accomplished and experimental effort to date, with the band diversifying a bit the song structures by incorporating more progressive and psychedelic elements, yet at the same time remaining incredibly song-oriented.
In your opinion what are the biggest differences between “Time Will Fuse its Worth” and “Static Tensions”?

“I think you nailed it in your previous sentence. We put a tighter reign on a lot of the basic song structures and were more conscious of writing songs. We wanted to cut a lot of the filler and we thought about how the songs would feel and fit in a live setting. Psychedelic music has been a big part of Kylesa since day one, but instead of having more jammy elements or long winded moments, we wanted to include the trippy parts into the songs as long as the song called for it. We were able to blend our influences a bit better than on the previous album. All the ideas were there with ‘Time Will Fuse Its Worth’ but with ‘Static Tensions’, they are realized and refined.”

Do you think the recordings of two Pink Floyd’s covers last year, “Set the Controls for the Center of the Sun” made available on your MySpace page and “Interstellar Overdrive” for the tribute album to Syd Barrett “Like Black Holes In The Sky” instigated Kylesa to pursue a more experimental and psychedelic direction on this record or is was just coincidence?

“I'd say it was a bit of both. We started to cover Pink FLoyd's ‘Set The Controls...’ a while ago because we thought we could really turn it into something of our own and add to the foundation of the song. I knew I wanted to do something like that for the new album because it really worked out well and it was incredibly fun to do. Later we were approached to record ‘Interstellar Overdrive’ and at that point we had already been covering the other Floyd song for about a year live. It's not like one day we decided to listen to Pink Floyd and go in a more psychedelic direction. We've been listening to Pink Floyd and psychedelic music for years and several of our past records suggest that. However, it wasn't until we covered ‘Set The Controls...’ that I decided to use more melodic singing on the record. I've never been that comfortable with my voice but Carl really liked it at the time of that recording session and suggested that I do more of it on the record. I thought about my vocals a lot before recording the new record. I wanted to improve upon them and give them some more focus.”

As mentioned before, the new album is starting to get some serious media coverage and judging by the fabulous prospects that lay ahead it seems that the name of Kylesa won’t be confined to the underground circuit for much longer.
Do you think it’ll be hard to resist the temptation of signing to a bigger multinational label if the opportunity eventually arrives to the table like it did for Lamb of God and Mastodon for example?

“It's an interesting time for metal right now. Metal is the biggest it's been in a long time. Time will tell how things unravel for heavy music in the counter culture.”

More info at: www.myspace.com/kylesa
Kylesa photo by Dusdin Condren

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Ever since their inception in 2001, Georgia’s Kylesa have been consistently and audaciously perfecting their sludge-rock art, gradually carving a niche that have became so resolutely of their own and establishing themselves as one of the genre’s most well-known and interesting names. I think it’s incontestable to say that their fourth full-length release “Static Tensions” is no exception to the rule. In fact, it’s their absolutely best and most immediate record to date, where Kylesa have finally grown into a colossal sludge-rock beast just about to blow the confines of the underground.
“Static Tensions” sees Kylesa deeply trimming down the jam-like ramblings of their previous record “Time Will Fuse Its Worth”, crafting shorter and more concise songs replete with memorable and compelling moments. Just don’t make the mistake of expecting any radio-friendly tunes here as Kylesa’s music continues to remain experimental and daring as ever, spiced up with layers of psychedelic rock and progressive and tribal percussion. It’s just that, whereas in past releases the band had an itch to meander into overlong and fuzzy sections, nowadays they opt to positively boost the songs with a more typical rock structure with greater emphasis on mesmerizing choruses and hummable melodies. It’s near impossible not to enjoy “Static Tensions” from front to back, there’s no impulse to skip forward to the next theme as all of them have their own distinct appeal and texture. Anyway, there are a handful of songs that I’d like to stand out like for example the opener “Scapegoat”, which kicks in with the pounding and dual drum charge of skin-bashers Carl McGinely and Eric Hernandez. It’s short and to the point, exuding an almost Hardcore-Punk feel with sludgy and gargantuan riffs provided by guitarists Phillip Cope and Laura Pleasants. Kylesa continue to weave a similar and punchy groove of distorted guitars and pounding percussion on the following two numbers “Insomnia for Months” and “Said and Done”, but then there’s an unexpected and tasteful transition into a more trippy and smoother pace in “Unknown Awareness” with the guitars echoing in a eerie and psychedelic, yet so wonderfully infectious tone. It’s definitely one of the albums highlights, just like the following theme “Running Red”, which starts with a haunting piano melody and the gentle crooning of Laura, sounding almost like a psychedelic lullaby until the punchy guitars and her enraged vocals burst in abruptly. The vocal interplay of guitarists Pleasants and Cope was always one of the most recognizable and appreciated traits of Kylesa, and the new record sees Laura putting a lot more emphasis on her melodic range, which turned out undeniably great and contrasts nicely with Cope’s more cavernous roars.
I could go on waxing lyrical about Kylesa’s “Static Tensions”, but I guess it suffices to add that it will be one best albums you’ll hear in 2009. (8.5/10)

Band info: www.myspace.com/kylesa
Label info: www.prostheticrecords.com

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