Like many of the artists that graced Miami for Ultra Music Festival, the weekend was a perfect opportunity to debut new music. Knife Party took full advantage of this, mixing three unreleased tunes into their hour long set. The tracks differ from the sound Knife Party fans have come to love, as they’ve heavily incorporated big room elements. Knife Party has been known to radically change their sound before, drifting away from the heavier dubstep of their youth on their diverse and refreshing new album Abandon Ship. Rob Swire embraced the criticism, using voiceovers on the album that said, “What the fuck is this disco shit, what happened to dubstep?” However, the album still maintained the Knife Party style with hit tracks such as the Bonfire-esque ‘Give It Up‘. Now, their three new releases seem to stray even greater from their dubstep roots.
The first preview is titled in Rob Swire’s typically satirical fashion, ‘Plur Police’. The track uses the vocals of ‘Bad Boys‘ to create a playful buildup that disappoints with its generic sounding big room drop. The second song ‘Kraken’ features progressive house star Tom Staar. This track features a more energetic and bouncy drop yet also seems stale and unoriginal. Finally, ‘Parliament Funk’ is by far the most exciting of the three. Its distinctly eerie and energetic buildup is classic Knife Party, and the drop hits hard with scorching electro and steady percussions. While “Parliament Funk” seems to pick up some of the slack from the other two, the three songs seem collectively disappointing for fans who were blown away by the duo’s debut album. You can check out the tracks below to judge for yourself or watch their full Ultra set here.
