Kong – Snake Magnet

It’s often said that the sign of a mental person is the fact that they believe themselves to be completely normal. They carry on living their lives in their own unique way, it’s everyone else that has the problem. Snake Magnet, the debut album from Oceansize offshoot Kong, is that type of mental individual. While the Lady Gagas and Kelly Clarksons of this world are topping the charts and dominating the radio, it’s refreshing for an album like Snake Magnet to come along and completely fuck with your ears. Whilst Snake Magnet may not have the hook laden tunes to cement a place in popular culture, it does have an undeniable confidence in its own jittery sound.

The album decimates roughly fifty minutes with a mix of post hardcore and punk metal, with opener “Leather Penny” starting off with an apocalyptic metal riff that soon paves the way for the insane howls of vocalist Steve Hodson. The album maintains a distinct sinister air about it throughout, with “Blood of A Dove” starting simply enough, before a descending swirl of hungover Nick Cave vocals and guitars to soundtrack a breakout at San Quentin.

Thrashing guitars and insane vocals, so far, so brutal. But Snake Magnet’s biggest advantage of being a sonic juggernaut of a record, one that almost literally floors you, is also it’s biggest weakness. Riot anthems are only going to carry a record so far, and whilst Snake Magnet initially comes across as a refreshing kick in the face, there’s only so long you can listen to instrumentation and traditional rhythms being tortured. That’s not to say the album is without its moments; throughout there are moments in Snake Magnet which hint at a greater musical savviness than we are being treated to. On “Sport” for instance, which toys with the idea of developing into a truly explosive finale, but instead rumbles along with intermittent outbursts. Or “A Hint of Rennit Innit”, which grinds along like the musical equivalent of two very large angry men throwing trains at each other.

Snake Magnet is great fun. It’s not essential, and it’s lack of anything that you can tap your foot to is made up for by the fact that your ears will most likely have fallen off by the time you’ve finished listening to it.

One suspects that for Kong, these riots are just the beginning.

Tracklist:
01. Leather Penny
02. Blood Of A Dove
03. Wet Your Knives
04. Gwant
05. Good Graphics
06. Nih
07. Sport
08. Hint Of Rennit Innit, A
09. Count To Nine
10. Long

Kong - Snake Magnet, 5.0 out of 5 based on 1 rating