The Knife - Full Of Fire

If the rumours are to be believed, The Knife are about to release an album that spans further than your average Disney film. ‘Full Of Fire’, then, for all its nine-minute monstrousness, is only one slim slice of what’s to come in ‘Shaking The Habitual’. All things thus far though point to one alarming, clear message: That of spelling out the grim truths of reality and giving you a reason to think and to feel and to fight. Think about it: That album title is about as revolutionary in message as they come these days. And ‘Full Of Fire’, unless we’re completely off the ball, is a determined sucker-punch to some of society’s misgivings.

And beaming out these nasty truths is one pulsating pressure-change. Describing all the song’s components at once would be like trying to count all the ants emerging from a busied nest. Let’s just say it begins as a tense, ominous being and it concludes in much the same state, only a hundred times more tense and ominous. Karin Dreijer’s voice is in full disguise as the song comes to its close, robotic cries of ‘Let’s talk about gender baby / Let’s talk about you and me’ bringing the gigantic rallying cry to its logical, extraordinary conclusion. Her vocals go from effect-stripped and clear to something unrecognisably hysterical.

It shows very little in common with the more striking immediacy of previous album ‘Silent Shout’, its dark discoball drama a thing of the past now. If anything it’s like the ‘Deep Cuts’ record reduced of all its sheen and stretched out into one piece of muscular, industrial electronica. There’s no doubting this track is full of fire - overflowing with it, even - and simply imagining it fitting into the surroundings of an album is one daunting prospect. But if anyone can pull it off, The Knife can.

Stream the music video/short film, directed by Marit Östberg below:



‘Shaking The Habitual’ is out 8th April internationally through Rabid/Brille/Mute.