Album
To Kill A King
The Spiritual Dark Age
January 12 2018 (These Are My Bones)
6/10
Words: Alison Mack
While To Kill A King's new album may contain a raft of singles like ‘The Good Old Days’, and title track ‘The Spiritual Dark Age’ plus the recently revealed ‘My God Your God’, this third full-length - "the last three years of my life painstakingly distilled into 40 minutes of music,” says frontman Ralph Pelleymounter - at times comes over as fighting to keep above the sheer weight of itself.
Produced by Gethin Pearson and the band’s keyboard player Ben Jackson, it contains the catchy ('Compare Scars'), the America-sized anthems ('My God & Your God', 'Bar Fights'), poppy rhythms ('No More Love Songs'), caustic lyrics on televangelism ('The Unspeakable Crimes of Peter Popoff'), folky vocals and bouncy à la Mumfords melodies (title track), and emotive piano ballads ('And Yet...').
But while covering a number of bases (on an album that will undoubtedly appeal to the US market), and drawing in theremin and strings alongside standard instrumentation to add to its folk-rock appeal, it all manages to still feel a bit passé.
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