Kings X - XV

‘XV’ is the latest album from one-time saviours of metal, Kings X. The Houston based trio arrived fully formed in 1988 with a combination of heaviness, groove and gorgeous Beatles-esque harmony laden vocals that - at the time - was genuinely innovative.

Right up until the mid 90’s they kept the standards high, although they never reached the heights of their firsts three albums. For the last decade however they have lost momentum, and with all three enjoying solo careers as well, the question is whether they have spread themselves too thin. At this stage they really need a belter of an album to recapture lost ground, and capitalise on the current worldwide up swing in rocks fortunes. Have they delivered?

Overview!

‘Pray’ opens with a lighter touch than some of Kings X previous albums, organic guitar sounds and adventurous textures being the name of the game rather than bone crushingly heavy ‘Dogman’ style low tuned riffery. A slightly punky edge feels a little incongruous, but many of the classic Kings X elements are here. There is sort of a ‘bluesier’ edge to a lot of the tracks here, in terms of riffs and guitar sounds, but pretty soon you realise that they are following a familiar format. The heavier numbers tend to feature Dug Pinnock as lead vocalist: with his distinctive bass playing to the fore, and the combination of riffy verses and harmony vocal heavy choruses are very much standard King X. But - and it is a big but - almost all of the genuinely inspirational moments that characterised their earlier work are absent. The whole effect is curiously muted and flat.

‘Repeating Myself’, ‘Julie’ and ‘I Don’t Know’ (all with Ty Tabor on lead vocals) are melodic, harmony laden, songs that are really the only songs that evoke their glory days - and are that much more effective for doing so.

Conclusion

I really wanted this to be a return to form. I have great memories of the glorious ‘Gretchen Goes To Nebraska’, an album I fell in love with back in 1989 - and with ‘Summerland’ and ‘Over My Head’, two songs that still rank amongst my favourites. But in my opinion XV is not going to change their fortunes, it is barring a few moments of inspiration and melody, an uninspiring collection from a band plainly in need of a rethink. In my humble opinion they need to spend a long time working and crafting on a new collection, whilst considering exactly what it was that made them so special in the first place – although it’s simple enough and really boils down to that combination of heaviness and outright melody. This album doesn’t have enough of either.