Killers & Kings

Album: Bloodstone & Diamonds (2014)
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Songfacts®:

  • This is a track from Machine Head's Bloodstone & Diamonds album. Frontman Rob Flynn blogged regarding the long player: "It's still what I would just call classic metal, but we've simplified beats, simplified riffs, taken the unnecessary complicated-ness of something and made it simple. I've even applied that to my lyrics, where I've stripped out a lot of extra words ('the's,' 'and's,' etc), and invented a lyrical technique I call 'clustering,' where you cluster vowels or cluster 'plosives' ('K's,' 'T's,' 'Ch's') together to make it sound heavier, or flow better. It doesn't read all that poetically, but in the song it sounds really cool. "

    "I've also really worked hard on sharpening up my rhyme schemes, finding clever places to place rhymes, instead of the usual place at the end of a line, or even again, 'clustering' rhymes. It makes an abstract concept like 'Killers & Kings' (which references 20+ Tarot Cards, and that I'm very proud of the end result) to have a real meaning."
  • A 10-inch vinyl single containing the "demo" version of the song was originally released on April 19, 2014, as part of that year's Record Store Day.

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