ctrl LIVE: The KVB [UK]

The KVB return to Control on December 12 with a detached, retro-chic electronic pulse that hits like a melancholic sledgehammer. Blending reverb-soaked production with minimalist electronics, the KVB's ever-evolving cold wave always reflects their mastery of atmosphere. On early releases such as 2012's debut album Always Then, Kat Day and Nicholas Wood's brittle beats and sonic blasts evoked Cabaret Voltaire and the Jesus and Mary Chain in equal measure. Later, the duo's style encompassed the streamlined, sharp-edged sounds of 2018's Only Now Forever, the spacious vistas of 2021's Unity, and the darkly danceable moods of 2024's Tremors. The KVB moved to Cleopatra for their next project, May 2023's Artefacts (Reimaginings from the Original Psychedelic Era). A celebration of the 50th anniversary of the first Nuggets collection, the album found Day and Wood reworking the songs of psych-rock pioneers including the Castaways, the Troggs, and the Pretty Things in their dark electro-rock style. Later in the year, Wood issued the third Saccades album, Land of the Hearth. Day and Wood returned to Invada for April 2024's Tremors. Revisiting the KVB's industrial and post-punk fundamentals, the album's dystopian pop was informed in part by Jorge Luis Borges' short stories about the shifting nature of truth. “The KVB is certainly not the only band that digs in the 80s, but it belongs to the best.” - Peek-a-boo Magazine