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Review: 'Amuse De Q'
'Little King'   

-  Label: 'Bandcamp'
-  Genre: 'Rock' -  Release Date: '3.9.21.'

Our Rating:
Amuse De Q is the latest album by Little King who have been around since the late 90's as Ryan Rossoff's offshoot of Tweed Quickly, this is the band's latest line-up and I have to admit from the moment I saw they listed there influences as Rush, Steely Dan and King Crimson I had a feeling this might not be for me.

The album opens with the distinctly Nu Metal (early System Of A Down) opening of Bombs Away, that's also the first single from the album, that's laced with some rather proggy edges that starts to mark this album out as being distinctly not my cup of tea, as they sing about life in lockdown and what life has become, as the almost garage guitar part gets going and sounds cool but is soon replaced by sort of a fusion Jazz rock part that isn't, to me this sounds like four songs melded into one and as such for me doesn't really work.

The albums second single Keyboard Soldier Mixes Blue Period style vocals with some cool metallic indie and a stop start construction about how we are all slaves to social media and need to step away from the keyboard before this goes all meandering and a bit widdly towards the end.

How Could You has a cool fiddle part, that I'd have liked to hear more of, as the double tracked sounding vocals lead into some weirdly constructed Prog rock, lets stick 5 ideas too many into a song, as this sounds rather unfocussed and I struggle to listen to this all the way through.

Set It Down opens with some ambient sounds and a military style snare drum before the hushed vocals start singing about being on Zoom and other modern maladies while sounding like they are in the middle of the malaise with no easy way out as the Spanish Style Guitar sounds good by itself.

Melpomene is of course the muse of tragedy and not a cool designer drug, this instrumental has a really nice violin part that sounds like an elegy for all those lost to Covid.

The shimmering guitars come in and the album's title track Amuse De Q gets going with an episodic feel and odd vocals that feel kind of pained and they tell us that being in lockdown is unhealthy and eventually the song builds into something else that kind of loses me in the twists and turns between the verses.

The album closes with Omega Son that mixes System Of A Down style Nu Metal with lyrics from a sci-fi movie and the most driving beat on the album as they seek safety from all the sickness and plague around them as they cram another five songs into one and end with a bit of a musical fusillade.

This album is only 29 minutes long but listening to it felt more like an hour plus. If unlike me you like Rush and Steely Dan this maybe for you, if so find out more at

https://littlekingtunes.com/ https://www.facebook.com/littlekingtunes


  author: simonovitch

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