2005's Ogre Tones was great. In fact, most of us fans thought it was their best since 98's Tapehead. Fast forward to now, when KX are back with a brand new album called XV. It's probably their fifteenth album if you put compilations and live albums together, I don't really know; but what I surely know and assure you is that, after a month of constant listening, they've actually bettered Ogre Tones.

In a build-up to the release, their first on SPV, Dug stated in an interview that this is going to be an album driven by short songs with a lot happening, ala 70s ZZ Top. That's cool, because that was the trick that made Ogre Tones so good. XV is that and a lot more though. The band are always known for their Beatlesque harmonies and a lot of soul/blues/gospel influences that go with their intelligent down-tuned groove heavy rock. But on this album, for starters, they've done a lot more as far as harmonies go. These guys have always exactly known when to do them and how to do them but the results are tremendous here. Ty's 'Repeating Myself' especially has the best harmonies they've ever done. Vocal-echo effect is also employed to great results on this one and the uptempo 'Alright' and 'Go Tell Somebody'. Also, though the songs are short and only has a few lead guitar breaks, this album has a lot of heavy guitars. Probably their heaviest since Dogman.

The album features Jerry singing the lead for only the third time in the band's existence and his song is a nice pop ditty called 'Julie'. His drumming on the other hand continues to be solid, groovy and straight-forward throughout the album. Ty contributes three excellent songs here including the aforementioned 'Repeating Myself', 'I Just Want to Live' and 'I Don't Know'. The rest of the album is all Dug's songs. His unique sounding bass drives the intro-verses of a couple of songs, the brilliant album-opener called 'Pray' and 'Move' before the signature heavy guitars come crashing-in in a completely awesome manner. Towards the end of the album are some of my favourite tracks of this album at this point. 'Love and Rockets (Hells Screaming)' and the bluesy 'No Lie' where Ty pulls off a Brian May during the solo break, help end the album in the typical heavy chugging King's X style, but I can't help but wonder if the album would've hit me a little faster had the track order been worked out a little differently. Because, though all are at least good, the first half sounds a little crowded with the softer songs.

This album is filled with top-of-the-game songwriting, addictive hooks, melodies, harmonies, brilliant grooves and top quality production thanks to the one and only Michael Wagener. One of the best 2008 releases yet.

Label: SPV
Year of Release: 2008