Kulk
New Cross Inn, London - 30 August 2025
"I
seriously recommend that you see them live"
I’m relatively
new to the pleasures of Kulk, having only seen them once before at
the ridiculously tiny Blondies in East London (great atmosphere;
can’t see a fucking thing unless you’re right at the front),
following a random YouTube recommendation. I’m relatively new to the
pleasures of Kulk, having only seen them once before at the
ridiculously tiny Blondies in East London (great atmosphere; can’t
see a fucking thing unless you’re right at the front), following a
random YouTube recommendation.
As
I’ve previously elsewhere, Metal is not my chosen genre, so I can’t
pick out the influences that others will find obvious, but what I
like about Kulk is that they pretty much sound like an early ‘80s
industrial punk band that REALLY love Black Sabbath.
Consisting of
drums plus vocals/ guitar, with lots of fx pedals and a dash of
synth, people have described them as ‘Doom’, but unless I completely
misunderstand what ‘Doom’ is,* those people are hard of hearing/
thinking. That said, it’s difficult to define the sound - It’s
Metal, but not as we know it; the riff is still king, but the
concept of ‘the riff’ is honed and deconstructed almost to
abstraction. For all I know, the world is awash with people doing
this kind of thing, but frankly I doubt it – the only other band
that is comparable that I know of is Warren Schoenbright.** If you
know the 7” where Loop and Godflesh covered each other’s songs, it’s
kind of like that, but not really….
They were
thunderously loud, and although they have the headbanging rhythms
(back/forward), they also have a groove (side to side) that makes
you want to dance, and dance I did (after only 2 drinks, and with
only one other person doing more than nodding), and proper both feet
coming off the floor dancing, not that embarrassed shuffling you see
all too often at gigs these days.
Recent LP It
Gets Worse is well worth your attention, but they work best as
a live experience, and I seriously recommend that you see them live
if you can. 9/10
*And I
absolutely do know what ‘Doom’ is.
**Is this a
new sub-genre? Abstract Metal? Avant-Metal?