ALBUM REVIEW: Bones Don’t Lie – Kingsmen
Stop us if you’ve heard this one before – a brand new band, finally ready to release their debut album to the world, find all their plans stymied by a global, world-as-we-knew-it-ending pandemic in 2020, scurrying then to release a follow-up to it and attempt to capitalise at least a little bit on any hype they might’ve built during the various lockdowns. Rhode Island metalcore upstarts KINGSMEN are one of the many, many bands that found themselves in that predicament with the April 2020 release of Revenge. Forgiveness. Recovery., and near three years on they’re on the cusp of releasing their sophomore album, Bones Don’t Lie.
What exactly those bones don’t lie about, is unclear. While the band state the album is about someone who’s been wronged, done wrong, and wants to do better, it’s left excruciatingly vague and often devolves into epithets and platitudes. Of course, not every album ever has to point exactly at specific events, and making lyrics purposefully vague can help more people relate to work and identify with it, so they’re perhaps due some benefit of the doubt here.
Where they aren’t, though, is in the music itself. Not to put too fine a point on it, but KINGSMEN really, really like FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH and, to an extent, DISTURBED. They throw those radio rock behemoths into a blender with modern metalcore and more than a hint of nu-metal for something that’s guaranteed to be a hit on certain radio stations, but often ends up falling flat creatively. The imaginatively-named Intro is barely a minute long and probably could’ve been folded into the following title track given how well they flow into each other.
That title track, though, is too plodding for an opener; there’s no real energy and vocally it’s laconic, with the kind of low register whisper-speak (think Vol. 3 era SLIPKNOT) into nasally clean chorus that’s everywhere on American rock radio. Bitter Half would’ve made a far better opener with its quicker pacing and high energy, though vocally it earns those DISTURBED comparisons in the verses before a serviceable metalcore clean chorus, and the breakdown is insipid. Trial By Fire is BREAKING BENJAMIN meets FFDP and it’s exactly as charmless as it sounds, while No Road Home manages to outdo all that’s come before by reaching yet another nadir. Lyrically repetitive and musically uninspiring, the constant repetition of “I been walking” as almost the entirety of the chorus is enough to lose the desire to finish the album.
Unfortunately, this remains a recurring theme throughout the album; KINGSMEN don’t quite seem to know what their own identity is, as they pull from all the previously mentioned bands without ever stepping out on their own, or particularly realising what it was that drew people to those bands in the first place. It’s hard to believe Bones Don’t Lie is only 32 minutes; it feels, much to our chagrin, far longer than that. The mid-pace plod almost every song affects, along with that laconic delivery and lack of fresh ideas, puts KINGSMEN firmly in their sophomore slump.
Rating: 4/10
Bones Don’t Lie is set for release on March 31st via SharpTone Records.
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