Knock out the same again...
In March of this year, Room Thirteen's very own Adrian Grobbelaar shared his thoughts on Knock Out Kaine's three track EP "KandyKaine" (make sure you check out the review here). This trio of tracks - 'Little Crystal', 'Coming Home' and 'Going Down' - feature once again on the British quartet's new release, "Burn It Up", along with the addition of two new sizzling tracks.
'Set the Night On FIre' is a pumping opener and instantly enters contention for being one of Knock Out Kaine's finest offerings to date. The call and answer vocals, although admittedly unoriginal, function fantastically and kick the EP off superbly. 'Time' contrasts nicely, almost offering a sound that intriguingly mixes Thin Lizzy's intimate, conversational lyrical style with traditional hair-swishing rock from many a decade ago.
As a standalone EP, it's a decent success, with their brand of balls-out rock bringing back the 1980s with unadulterated flair. The foursome have an energetic neo-Eighties sound that will effortlessly whisk you back to the leather-clad days of Motley Crue. The vocal harmonies are well layered, the drums boom with a dominating presence and the guitars sport beautifully crispy tones. "Burn It Up" is a fiery release from the Lincolnshire rockers, but will most likely only appeal to you if "KandyKaine" is not sitting comfortably amongst your CD collection.
In our daily lives, we are encouraged to recycle, but overall this just feels like an effortless, cost-effective option that will deceive consumers into believing that they are being offered a collection of entirely new material. Dear Knock Out Kaine, if you are going to reuse the entirety of an EP on a new release, then the least you could do was give us a full length album! However, knowing our luck, an album would probably just be two new tracks wedged at the beginning of this EP...