Kaki King/ Junior

Kaki King
Junior
(Cooking Vinyl)

Atlanta native Kaki King is still relatively unknown on these shores, but for the better part of a decade she’s been collecting accolades on the other side of the pond like they were going out of fashion.
The closest many of us in the UK will have come to her music is Sean Penn’s film ‘Into The Wild’, for which she wrote the score – although that rather assumes that you can tolerate Sean Penn doing, well, anything at all.
It’s somewhat fitting – and we dare say inevitable – then, that there’s distinctly filmic quality to many of the tracks on her fifth studio LP, Junior. The progressive rises and falls on the instrumental ‘Everything Has An End, Even Sadness’ paints a gorgeous mental picture and would easily slot into any film score.
Yet, this is merely one string to King’s bow and every now and then she throws a curve ball, stepping out of the ambient and into slightly more daring territory. ‘Death Head’, for example, comes over all pop-punk whilst ‘Spit It Back In My Mouth’ has an air of space-rock to it. Quite a departure, we think you’ll agree.
So what you really have here is two albums: a film score in the waiting and a collection of experimental musings that scratch an itch. Does it work? Just about, and while it may not be the slickest effort you’re ever likely to hear, it’s certainly a great display of versatility that explains why she has been so revered for the past ten years.