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Written
by William Elgin, posted by blog admin
The
power trio KALO spotlights the talents of vocalist and guitarist Bat-Or Kalo
but her musical partners bassist Mack McKinney and drummer Mike Alexander are
more than capable of matching her musical firepower and complement her playing
extraordinarily well. The band’s fourth release, Wild Change, is an eleven song
effort that doesn’t content itself with pursuing one style or formula but
definitely excels in a much stronger way when they play to Kalo’s strengths as
a gut wrenching blues singer with finesse and passion alike to burn. The
songwriting certainly knows its way around the musical style and makes
invigorating use of some long standing tropes, but it also features a number of
inventive musical and lyrical flourishes that are Kalo’s own, plus an
underrated sense of humor that’s always useful for this sort of music.
“One
Mississippi” is a swaggering and sinewy blues rocker that moves at a brisk pace
and has quite a bit of jump thanks to the rhythm section’s playing. Kalo gives
a physical and assertive performance that feels like she’s throwing all of
herself into the music. This sort of commitment and no nonsense approach to
their material gives Wild Change a mightily promising beginning. The
appreciative live crowd heard at the end is just an added bonus to a listener’s
enjoyment. “Isabel” is a real guitar wailer from the beginning and Kalo further
spices it up with a do or die vocal that really turns up the heat for the song’s
chorus. There’s some piano creeping through the cacophony during the chorus
that gives it an extra dramatic spike. The band turns toward hard edged R&B
on “Upside Down” and Kalo delivers a really showstopper vocal on a song that
sounds like it was cut live in the studio. There’s a kinetic energy they
achieve here, regardless, that sounds like a band letting loose and inspired by
each other’s contributions. It’s one of the best moments on Wild Change for
pure musical interplay.
“Fix”
is a little more obviously commercial than some of the other songs in the sense
that it seems a little more ready made to be among the new songs the band will
incorporate into their live act and the chorus is far punchier than anything
else on Wild Change. Any widespread appeal this song holds isn’t a bad thing.
The symbolism in the lyrics doesn’t remake the songwriting wheel, but there’s
no question that there’s a lot of vulnerability masked by the sonic bluster. “Wild
Change” is a gritty title track that makes its relatively simple bluesy stomp
as effective as possible, but Kalo’s wide-eyed belt is the critical factor in
pushing this song over the top into something truly memorable. The loose
shuffle opening “Smile and Blush” ushers in some shimmering acoustic guitars
and KALO maintains the same low-fi approach for the entirety of the track. Kalo
scales her voice back appropriately and provides the song with a rather
haunting, lyrical vocal performance. There’s an abundance of creativity on Wild
Change that helps it stand out from the pack as a release worth noting. Kalo
continues to grow as a vocalist and songwriter with each new release and the
band, as a whole, shows no signs of slowing down.
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