Album Review: Knocked Loose – A Different Shade Of Blue

When Knocked Loose’s debut LP Laugh Tracks arrived in 2016, it gave even the burliest of death metal fans an excuse to whip out a karate kick in the pit, guilt-free, given its fluid mesh with hardcore sounds. 

While the same rings true for the group's second offering A Different Shade Of Blue, it’s doubtful that the group will pick up any new admirers, due to this collection of tracks (screeching in under 40 minutes) sounding exactly the same as the blueprint laid down on LP number one.

Sure, cuts like Trapped In The Grasp Of A Memory and Mistakes Like Fractures up the sinister atmosphere, combining Slayer’s Hell Awaits with the slams and chainsaw guitars of Mindsnare and Hatebreed. Additionally, the guest spots of Emma Boster (Dying Wish) on A Serpent’s Touch and Keith Buckley (Every Time I Die) on Forget Your Name work wonderfully, with Boster somehow one-upping the ferocious shrieks of frontman Bryan Garris.

However, while cuts like In The Walls and ...And Still I Wander South are good in their own right, they are two examples of the broader problem with this LP – Knocked Loose aren’t tapping into anything new here.