Thousand Foot Krutch’s origins can be traced back to
Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. They
released their Tooth & Nail Records debut PHENOMENON in 2003. Over the years they put out such memorable
songs as: ‘Rawkfist’, ‘Move’, ‘The Flame in All of Us’, and ‘Already
Home’. In 2014 they independently
released OXYGEN: INHALE, with its first single ‘Born this Way’. Fast forward to June 2016 and the band
released the sequel EXHALE (The Fuel Music).
Thousand Foot Krutch is: Trevor McNevan (lead vocals, guitar), Joel
Bruyere (bass guitar), and Steve Augustine (drums, percussion). The group’s music has been used by WWE,
Nascar, and MLB among others. EXHALE
debuted at #34 on the US Billboard 200.
‘Running with Giants’ is a rock song of empowerment: “I am
not alone here/I’m not on my own here/I am not alone/I’m not on my own/Cause I
am running with giants everywhere I go/It’s an unspoken alliance/So I can just
let go/I’ve been running with giants everywhere I go/It’s an unspoken
alliance/So I can just let go”.
‘Incomplete’ is about perseverance: “No one ever said there wouldn’t be
waves/Sometimes shovels have to dig graves/And I’ve burned a lot of matches
tryin’ to make flames/And lips can sink ships/But prayers create change.../I
have a lot of ‘friends’ who want what we’ve made but don’t know the pain/The
beasts that we’ve slain”.
‘Give up the Ghost’ rocks hard and testifies: “I’ve seen the
devil and I’ve met fear/Met them both on the road that led me here/I’ve met God
and I’ve saw life/And He saved mine a million times/I’ve met trouble and I’ve
met rain/Laughed with joy and cried with pain/But now I see and I believe/That
the ghosts that haunt me have been outhaunted”.
‘A Different Kind of Dynamite’ speaks of the power God can give us:
“Don’t underestimate me/I run with giants and no safeties/You can call me
crazy/But keep hating, it don’t phase me/Bring it on/Your whole empire versus
my Messiah/Facin’ different types of Goliath’s, takin’ it higher/Like shots
fired in the middle of Vegas/Roll tide in the middle of the streets/Like a dog
fight in a clear blue sky/We fight with a different kind of dynamite”.
‘The River’ is a rocker about purification: “Follow me down
to the river, hey/Follow me out of the woods/Follow me in, to wash away my
sins/The view up here’s no good.../I’m goin’ in where the water lives/Couldn’t
stop me if you could.../Follow me down to the river, hey/Take a drink, it’s
good”. ‘Push’ is a battle cry: “If we
just keep running away we’ll never make it alive/Til we stand and we fight/Aim,
fire, and blow it away/We’re storming enemy lines/Leaving no one behind”.
‘Off the Rails’ is a journal entry of sorts addressed to
God: “Am I the fire or the spark?/Or am I here to be the room You heat?/Am I
everything You hoped?/Or was my channel way too hard to reach?/Is it more than
I can take?/Or is it everything I’ll ever need?/What if I don’t know what to
say?/What if I’m not who I’m supposed to be?”
‘Adrenaline’ is a heavy rap/rock song about having fun: “If you want it,
then we got it/We won’t let up ‘till we get enough/Adrenaline overload/If you
need it, then we bleed it/Make some room, here comes the boom!/Adrenaline
overload/And we won’t let it off/There’s nothin’ that can stop it/Until we’re
in the coffin”.
‘Lifeline’ has a chorus that is melodic and cries out for
help: “When I get angry I feel weak/And hear these voices in my head telling me
to fall beneath/Cause they’ll make everything okay/How did I get
here?/Everything’s unclear/I never meant to cause you pain/Give me a reason I
can believe in/I need it all this time/Send me a lifeline”. ‘Can’t Stop This’ could be about spiritual
warfare and includes the sounds of sirens and these words: “You shouldn’t have
done it/Now there’s blood in the water/You can’t stop this thing we’ve
started/Word of mouth, there’s a snake in the garden/You can’t stop this thing
we started”.
‘Born Again’ rocks and includes this confession of faith:
“I’m just a man that by grace was given a second chance/I feel like I’ve been
born again”. Last up is ‘Honest’, the
only ballad to be found here. It’s a
good one though! It’s a song of
spiritual reflection: “They say heaven is a place where our pain is washed
away/With no room for all the torment of choices that we’ve made/I’m a broken
man saved by grace/Tossed alone inside this maze.../You give us life and
meaning/You give us hope”.
I believe EXHALE is a great album! People who may say the album doesn’t break
new ground musically or lyrically are correct in their assessment. That being said, if you’ve liked what Krutch
has presented over the past several years, you’ll like EXHALE and see it as a
continuation of their artistry.
Lyrically, Krutch shares their Christian faith in a way that will appeal
more to the younger than the older crowd, but that is their fan base after
all. The band is not setting out to
write a theological textbook but rather to encourage, inspire, and motivate
their listeners with energetic rock music as the vehicle. Fans of Skillet will like EXHALE, which I’m
rating 95%. For more info visit: www.thousandfootkrutch.com and www.thefuelmusic.com.