Khaøs - Risen

Khaøs Risen cover
Khaøs
Risen
Plastichead Distribution/MRR Records
2014
6
Generic and famous by association, were two things that came to my mind when listening to Khaøs’ debut album. Let me explain myself… I have nothing against the band… but while they do seem to have some decent ideas on occasion, they do take forever to get them across, seemingly caught in a one dimensional mid-tempo approach with very little variation. Their style would be best described as modern grungy rock/metal with Chandler Mogel of Outloud and Chrome Public.
 
In their overt simplicity, most of their songs, end up end up either reminding other “more” famous songs or being slightly boring or when they are in fact decent they end up sounding to sugar-coated. It’s not all bad, but unless your idea of rock and metal is very open and would happily include all the newer bands from America in there and all the new rock influences, this might not be your cup of tea. Songs like “After the Silence” and “Crisis Factor” work mainly because of their choruses, “Hung The Moon” has a good performance, but is not that much worth mentioning apart from a semi decent short lead... “Imagined Danger” almost manages to recapture the lost momentum, but narrowly misses the mark.
 
While there are several semi decent songs on the album and Mogel’s in quite a capable studio vocalist, the point is that few songs manage to actually utilize him successfully. Overstretching rather simple forms and simple orchestrations begets you rather dull results, I am afraid to report and just a good vocalist with a reasonably nice timbre, cannot alone get you through an entire album, if the songwriting is not top notch. Also Mogel seems to be involving himself in a million projects and it’s his right to do so. But back in the day, great singers would usually stay in a band and then go to another when they would no longer be part of that one band for whatever reason. There would be the rare guest spot or some comic relief or charity single, but these days there are people who seemingly have done only a couple of proper albums and starred in 50 “side projects” and that’s a bit ridiculous imho. Some people tend to spread themselves too thin.
 
Khaøs have an EP and now this debut. There’s some talent and a few good melodies/songs, but I found the whole effort rather underwhelming as a whole. In trying to be too modern it’s too homogenized and lacks an edge. The production also doesn’t help too much with all the instruments cluttered at the bottom end and Mogel floating on top of them, sounding a bit Karaoke-ish in the mix.