Zagreb, Croatia based noise rock infused metal / punk band KEVLAR BIKINI have been around for 10 years now and have released 3 full lengths, first two as quartet, both mixed by the legendary Tomas Skogsberg (Entombed, Refused, Hellacopters, etc.) and mastered by Pelle Henricsson (Refused, Meshuggah, Poison the Well, In Flames, Raised Fist, etc.), followed up by 2018’s “Rants, Riffage and Rousing Rhythms”, which was their first offering as a three-piece. This year, they’re back with the aplty named fourth album “OPT-OUTism”, and we’re pleased to give you a quick tour of the key insights behind the record and its lyrics themes.
This Zagreb-based hardcore punk trio delivers another comprehensive collection of immensely powerful tunes, which have been saturated with gracious servings of magnificent elements of metal and noise rock. The band sounds vital, relevant, highly energetic throughout the entire album without any intention to decrease the intensity and slow down. As a result, they have a new album “OPT-OUTism“, which provides sheer sonic aggression separated in ten high-octane compositions, loaded with threatening vocals, massive riffs, catchy basslines and a badass drumming performance that will certainly shake your entire body.
“𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐾𝑒𝑣𝑙𝑎𝑟 𝐵𝑖𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑖 𝑞𝑢𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑜 𝑎 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑜 𝑖𝑛 2015. 𝐷𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑙𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑙 𝑢𝑝, 𝑤𝑒 𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑘 𝑎 𝑠𝑙𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑑𝑖𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑛 𝑡𝑜𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑑𝑠 𝑎 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑠𝑛𝑎𝑟𝑘𝑦, 𝑑𝑖𝑟𝑡𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎𝑔𝑔𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑠𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑠𝑐𝑎𝑝𝑒.”
The result was our third album “Rants, Riffage and Rousing Rhythms”, released in autumn of 2018. The self-explanatory tongue twister of a name describes not only the collage of songs on the album, but also the overall revamped style of the group.
“Rants“ set the tone for our latest effort “OPT-OUTism“, released earlier this month via Geenger Records.
“OPT-OUTism“ is our fourth studio album and the name is supposed to represent the culture of opting-out, like a principle or philosophy of not participating or being a part of something. It is a principle that became sacred to me over the years.
The album was recorded in Soundcage studio by Marizza and mixed/mastered in Chicken Sound Studio by Beli.
Continued below…
“𝐹𝑖𝑟𝑠𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑑” 𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑏𝑦 𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑦:
Ballerina’s Toes is a boot-in-the-face album opener with some nice drumming. Lyrically it is a song about using desensitization as a coping mechanism.
Bride in a Torn Up Wedding Dress is a song that would rock exactly the same even if we hadn’t spent an entire day in studio recording the piano part on it.
Night Shift Monomania is a song about that one thing that you keep obsessing about. That worm between your ears that just keeps burrowing and doesn’t let you sleep at night.
Failing as an Adult, a fairly self-explanatory title, it’s about not meeting society’s standards at a certain age… a retrospective if you will, haha. It even has a dive-bomb in it.
Feral Fun is a song about utter discontent towards society and a fantasy about just getting up and leaving… a form of mental-escapism. Probably my favorite one, lyric wise.
Son of a Grinder has an opening line „Midlife angst didn’t pay off at all” witch is a reference to the opening line of Nirvana’s “Serve the Servants” (Teenage angst has paid off well).
The Wailer – the guy from the song that „has no legs and sells used porn mags“ used to sell ’em on Trešnjevački plac, that’s the market place in our home town… and his name was Darko.
Flirting with Nihilism – believing in nothing is sexy! It’s one of our more ambient songs and it’s probably more fun to listen than it is to play.
Quench is a song about social distancing and staying at home. The important part is that I’ve written it in February of 2019 so it has NOTHING to do with this whole Covid thang. Coincidence, you tell me, haha.
Oozing Optimism probably has the only „nice“ part on the album and it is the angelic kid’s voices at the end of the song.
Plans for 2020:
It’s no news that all shows are canceled, ours included, we can only wait to see what happens and plan our next moves.
We are still releasing the new album soon so that is a huge deal for us. We’ll probably make more videos , ideally a video for each song.Thanks for the opportunity to present ourselves to Idioteq readers.
