KASMs - Spayed

So, you may have noticed a trend in my album reviews: I seem to slant towards the gothic/post-punk style of music when it comes to music and if you find that somehow depressing STOP READING RIGHT NOW! Anyway, now that we've got that sorted out, yes, I like goth music and by goth music I mean music in the vein of Joy Division, Bauhaus and Siouxsie and the Banshees as I have no love for the likes of Sisters of Mercy and the hordes of clones thereof that seem to characterize said genre. One might say that I have a very old-school taste for gothic and obviously as a direct consequence of this I will obviously shun any modern attempts at making music even remotely gothic.

And the person saying that would be wrong, seeing as there are so many good bands reinventing the field of gothic music even in this modern day and age. KASMs comes to mind, what with them having released their debut album "Spayed" less than a month ago. Come on, any band citing Subtonix as an influence has to be good.

"Spayed" is a nice bit of old gothic sound, characterized by the haunting voice of their female singer and jagged guitars. The band itself has coined the term "shriekbeat" to characterize their music, apparently in a bid to distance themselves from the "cooler" terms like "new grave" and "the new thing," both used liberally by the NME. Based on the band's public profile one could easily dismiss "Spayed" as another NME-dearie in the vein of The Horrors and the more recent White Lies, but it would be doing the album injustice. While both aforementioned bands have their own schticks and excel at them they are both extremely derivative in ways seen and heard before, KASMs isn't afraid to dig deeper into the tradition of dark alternative music to create a sound which is equal parts Siouxsie and the Banshees, Bauhaus and Sonic Youth. All songs on the album have a manic energy to them with just enough of an experimental mindset to make them sound fresh.

If I were forced to pick favourites from the album they'd be the opening "Male Bonding" and the nicely disturbing "Krih." All in all, a solid album in my opinion. In a nutshell:

Band: KASMs
Album: Spayed
Rating: Five points of indie cred out of five