Live Review: LISTEN: King Krule 'Rock Bottom'

The latest track from English wonderkid King Krule has been out for a week or so but this is the kind of song you need to soak in for a while. Krule is a purveyor of a style that’s been called “bluewave”, ballads of insomniac romance and nocturnal woe from an echoing hermit’s cave — it’s the kind of music that sounds like 3am.

Really, though, it’s just a change of clothes for the same lovesick teenage melodrama that Elvis, the Beatles and Morrissey have peddled since the start of ‘pop music’.

‘Rock Bottom’ starts off as archetypal bluewave, those hanging, jazzy chords and the plain lament “I’ve hit rock bottom” wailed in a defiantly provincial accent. But there’s more this time—subtle keys, urgent, maybe even funky percussion and an ebbing and flowing dynamic.

It’s an important change for a guy previously characterized as a lonely narcoleptic serenading a laptop in his bedroom. With this expanded, full band sound, you can picture a huge crowd singing along to Krule’s anthems of loneliness and isolation. It also signals an expansion of ambition, an exciting sign from an emerging young artist. Play it in the early hours and keep an eye out for this one.

Words by Matt Nielson

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