Just when I thought I’d never hear from LA’s criminally overlooked melodic metal trio Kyng again, a 10 song acoustic album flew in under the radar mid-2021. Beyond the Dead Woods includes acoustic versions of songs from 2016’s Breathe in the Water and 2011’s Trampled Sun, plus brilliant covers of David Bowie’s Starman and Metallica’s Escape. The title track is the only new original song.
The story behind this album as told on the band’s Bandcamp page is that the album was recorded in a lull in a tour in a studio in Mexico on borrowed gear, and put aside for years. By the time the tapes were resurrected, the band found the vocal tracks had been lost and needed to be rerecorded, which they did in live ‘one shot’ fashion. You would never know this album was not recorded all at once, the production is so sparkling and seamless.
I can only hope this marks a path forward for Kyng, rumored to have struggled with member and label issues in recent years. I’ve found them to be one of the most talented and underrated underground heavy bands of the last decade.
Find Kyng on the web
https://kynglives.bandcamp.com
https://twitter.com/kyngband
https://www.instagram.com/kyngband
https://www.facebook.com/Kyngband/
