New members! Old members! New sound! The girls are BACK and stronger than ever. As a group, KAQRIYOTERROR have never been afraid to push the boundaries of taste or sensibility, and “Ensemble Berserk” is the latest chapter of their erotic grotesque nonsense storybook.

If you haven’t been keeping up with KAQRIYO, the group has had a few member changes! Yamakomaro came back only to leave us once again, Sumomo is on hiatus for health reasons, Nonamera, our beloved queen bee, is back with a solo career in tow and we have new member RЯ (Arlya) who took over all of the screaming parts. In fact, during the initial reveal livestream of the new system it was mentioned that RЯ asked to have a lot of screaming parts and we’re pleased to announce that listening to the album, you can tell she’s one happy lady right now.

Mixing the old and new starts right away on “Renbin Pantomime” (Pity Pantomime). The first voice you hear is Nonamera before the rest of the opening verse is delivered by Komari Yuu, and then right into RЯ screeching while Noa Rondo fills your headphones with her husky voice. They’re a tight unit! 

Musically, the album is kind of all over the place but trust us, this is a very good thing. You have elements of the kind of electromagnetic metal sound you’d expect from the group on songs like “24/7” and “Craving” but there’s also a more… down to earth sound, of sorts, in the other songs. In the sense that things like metalcore and emo are genres performed by real musicians and not 4 evil mountain spirits. While they’re genres that have been tackled by Codomomental groups like Tsurezure before, there’s no real overlap. KAQRIYO’s approach to them is very uniquely KAQRIYO – you couldn’t really have another group do something like “Full Time Dive” but they could be on the same evil playlist together.

There’s also the case of “Who are U?” – Calling it an odd one out even among an album of odd ones out would still feel incorrect, but it is very standout. Almost like a technopop palette cleanser in a sea of machine gun-like drums and RЯ’s demonic screeching. It’s light and breezy, and the reduplication in the chorus is just fun. “Ukiuki JUMP / Guchiguchi GIRL / Kurikuri EYES” is a lot of fun to belt out while in your room alone. What, you’re all not doing that too? Just me? Well… it is fun at least.

As a pre-end-of-album (totally a real phrase) track, “Not Killed” feels like the album’s zenith. It has that emo rock sound that permeates the full body of work but with a few extra twists and turns. Which in itself is an understatement, if anybody says “I was thinking while listening to this that a screamo rap verse should totally go here”, they’re lying to you. If “Renbin Pantomime” is the front-facing persona of the album, “Not Killed” is the chaotic mass of thoughts lurking in the back that most people don’t get to see. Same with “décedance”; both chaotic, both out of the box, both KAQRIYO.

In short… it’s a good album! Our review might be a little late but we saw an opportunity for a trilogy of pieces about certain Codomomental artists. We have something very fun for tomorrow, so be sure to build the hype while listening to “Ensemble Berserk” and Nonamera’s “My name is…”. Trust and believe, tomorrow is for the worldwide girls.