Cobra Khan - Shredding the Cobra's Punk Skin

"I always felt there was something unfinished about it," says vocalist/guitarist and chief songwriter Milon Williams of Cobra Khan’s back catalogue. "I always had reservations about it. When I came out with these 13 songs relatively fast I was really happy."

The rebirth of Cobra Khan owes itself to a relatively quiet summer for Williams, allowing him to rediscover what it was about the music he once listened to that led him to where he is now.

"Over summer I guess I had a lot of time to myself, outside of the pressure of the practice room. I was immersed in a lot of records, and given the nature of the holiday period, listening to that old stuff and getting a sense of nostalgia for the music that built my musical taste."

The bands that Williams gained inspiration from over that period are perhaps a little different from what you might expect this former Sommerset guitarist to be incorporating into his own band’s sound. Specifically, he mentions Black Sabbath, Killing Joke and Big Black, although he contends there are many more obvious and not so obvious references for us to listen out for.

"I think over that time as well, I listened to a lot of my Creation records to balance out the more abrasive side of what the band does."

With such unorthodox influences for a punk rock veteran floating within his head that summer, Williams set about recording the demos for what would become Cobra Khan’s latest mutation: a heavier, darker and more atmospheric monster than anyone could have predicted.

Helgorithms, the album’s title track, kicks things off – frantic in typical Cobra Khan style, but that really is where the similarities end. It’s dark, heavy, sludgy and a fittingly rough and confrontational way to introduce the band’s change in tack. Track two, Fly On, brings another change in pace, slowing things down into an ambient, star-gazer rock number. Sarah Fox’s keys really take precedence here, contributing far more to the song’s overall sound than anything in the band’s earlier material where they were used simply to add texture. This opening combo really hints at a rock band (which includes Ben Lee on guitar, Andrew Morton on drums and now Evan Short on bass) with an exciting versatility that really works for it. ‘Helgorithms’ is anything but generic, and, dare I say, in parts it’s actually very danceable.

Having written and demoed the material, Williams presented it to the rest of the band, giving them a very short timeframe in which to work up the songs before their intended recording date. It was at this time that founding bass player and ElevenfiftySeven label manager Dean Cameron decided to part ways with Cobra Khan to focus on running the label. Instead Williams played bass on ‘Helgorithms’ and since Concord Dawn’s Evan Short (also formerly of metal outfit Day One and once a short-term fill-in bassist for punk rock act Kitsch) has stepped in as bassist.

Fresh off the Sommerset reunion tour, Williams took the rest of Cobra Khan on an unusual recording experience. Following two days of recording drums at The Lab and recording the keyboard sections at his own home, the band recorded guitars and vocals at the home studio of Zorran Mendosa, an up-and-coming engineer/producer who has recently recorded the likes of Antagonist A.D., Second Theory and In Dread Response.

"He’s moved back home with his parents and started a studio in his garage. His parents’ living room is right next door, so there’s some restrictions with noise," Williams laughs before saying the restrictions resulted in an interesting sound for ‘Helgorithms’.

"We couldn’t record with our guitar amps loud – we recorded the guitars through a Palmer speaker emulator. His (Mendosa’s) alternative method was taking the DI signal and then recording the DI signal at the same time as the emulator, then take the recording to another session and feeding it through the miked-up amps. But we decided that we were happy with the Palmer signal. It sounded really raw and crushed up."

Having been mixed by Mendosa, under Williams’ watchful eye, and mastered by Swedes Pelle Henrickson and Eskil Lovestrom (Refused, Poison The Well, and our own Blindspott and Take The Willing) and touched up by Evan Short, Cobra Khan was faced with the daunting task of pacing what is an ambitious and diverse record.

"I had to figure out how it was going to open. Was it going to be a confrontational start or relaxed? I couldn’t work it out for ages. I sat there with Evan and it took a long time, but the first two tracks opened the soundscape for the rest of the album. When you’re writing an album with that level of experimentation the album’s going to have a kind of identity crisis. It depends on whether you’re writing for a target audience or a personal package. I’m only really comfortable with the latter."

And after much labouring, soul searching and going back to the drawing board, Williams is now confident that ‘Helgorithms’, due for October 27 release through ElevenFiftySeven, is a record that’s certainly not suffering from an identity crisis of any description.

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