On You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To, Knocked Loose have honed in on a diverse, cohesive and savagely aggressive album that sums up the massive strides they’ve taken during their decade as a band, and asserts their boundless potential going forward. Internally, there was the need to challenge themselves as songwriters while retaining the merciless intensity and unflinching honesty that have always been their calling cards. Externally, there was a whole new set of eyes on the hard-touring Louisville quintet, following a banner year on the road, during which they’d brought their underground-seasoned sound to some of the world’s biggest stages.
From the start, You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To plunges listeners into a cauldron of mental and spiritual anguish. But the album’s title contains a note of reassurance amid the turmoil. The phrase originates from an experience that frontman Bryan Garris, who suffers from what he calls a “borderline phobia of flying,” had during a particularly trying flight. As he battled his nerves during takeoff, the vocalist found himself talking to a woman seated next to him. When he confided in her about his anxiety, she assured, “You won’t go before you’re supposed to.”
But glossing over negative emotions isn’t what Knocked Loose are about. The new songs find them plumbing through new depths of loathing — directed both inward and outward. Their raging lead single Blinding Faith skillfully wields whiplash tempo changes in service of a scathing indictment of religious groupthink, and the hypocrisy that can sometimes accompany an outwardly pious life.
“It was just hilarious how many people showed up to church that I knew were rude, horrible, selfish people,” guitarist Isaac Hale reflects of attending church with his mother in his younger years. “They knew that it made them seem like a better person — or if they said the words, it would redeem them of any negative quality just because they showed face.”
Blinding Faith is available today alongside a video directed by Kevin Lombardo. Watch below.
Across 10 tracks and 27 gripping minutes, You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To leans into Knocked Loose’s most extreme impulses, from blastbeat-driven fury, chaotic turbulence and seismic breakdowns, while seasoning the mix with ear-catching auxiliary percussion, evocative samples and shout-along hooks, all interwoven to perfection by Grammy-nominated, pop-savy producer Drew “WZRD BLD” Fulk.
You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To is filled with boundary-pushing textures and samples the band has collected over the years. On Suffocate, Garris teams up with pop-meets-metal trailblazer Poppy, for an effort that contrasts an oppressive heaviness befitting the title with a dance-y, syncopated groove and the most concussive reggaeton rhythm you’ve ever heard. Samples of what sounds like meditative singing bowls open the album to Take Me Home, with its spoken-word intro, ear-catching auxiliary percussion and brief yet evocative concluding country-song snippet. Elements like these only make the breakneck blur of a track like Moss Covers All, a song that Garris says deals with his ever-present longing for the comfort of home, feel that much more urgent.
“On this album, we go the fastest we’ve ever gone; we go the scariest we’ve ever gone. We also go the catchiest and the most melodic that we’ve ever gone, and that’s the point,” Hale says. “Instead of branching off into a specific direction, we want to encompass ALL directions.”
There’s no ceiling for hardcore in 2024 — even an outfit as uncompromising as Knocked Loose can turn up in mainstream-adjacent spaces and win over new fans (see 2023’s viral Coachella and Bonnaroo sets). But there’s a center to what they do that will never change: uncompromising heaviness, both sonically and thematically. What is evolving is their drive to find new ways to convey that heaviness, and add tasteful variety that only highlights their undiminished ferocity. Everywhere Knocked Loose have been is here on this record — but so is everywhere they may yet go.
Knocked Loose are currently wrapping a sold out EU/UK run and hit the road again late April on headlining North American tour. The run hits both coasts and includes two sold out nights in New York City at Brooklyn Steel and Terminal 5 plus sold out shows at Austin’s Stubbs Amphitheater, The Shrine in Los Angeles and more. Show Me The Body, Loathe and Speed will support.
