KEN mode – “I Cannot”

Last year, the Winnipeg noise rock brutalists KEN mode made a big return with Null. It’s the first album to feature the band’s newest member, multi-instrumentalist Kathryn Kerr, and it goes hard. Today, KEN mode have shared a new song that’s not on the LP, and this one goes hard, too.

“I Cannot” is a seething lurch with an unapologetically ugly bass tone and some unexpected squalls of free-jazz saxophone from Kathryn Kerr. It sounds huge. In the Bandcamp description, the band says that that they were trying to achieve something specific with the track:

We were looking for something ignorantly furious with this one, and it shows in the riffs. Equal parts My War, ’90s metalcore, and some noise post-rock. As much as everyone getting along would be nice, I don’t think I want to be on the same side as y’all in the end. Ya dig?

Mission accomplished. “I Cannot” is the second single that KEN mode have released this year; the souped-up bulldozer “Painless” came out last month. Below, listen to both “I Cannot” and “Painless.”

“I Cannot” is out now on Artoffact Records.