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One stage at a time, Captain Kaiser has conquered the punk scene while driving the van, celebrating life and making the walls drip with sweat.

The band has grown, but that word means more than bigger rooms or stage. It refers to a new stage in their musical development, a level of emotional depth they’ve never explored before, Captain Kaiser sounds more raw and pure than ever, thanks to producer and hardcore wizard Jay Maas (Defeater, Title Fight, Death Of A Nation), without having lost their knack for catchy melodies. One calls it hardcore and others talks about postpunk, but let’s forget the tags and just feel it, right there where it hurts.

Their latest record RHYME&REASON shows a band in their prime. After losing his mother four years ago, frontman Sascha Vansant only now screams what he couldn’t tell his mates for so long in lyrics that soothe the soul as much as they cut it like a knife. You hear him search for every word, and at the end, the catharsis is deserved. It’s easy to imagine how he looks up to the sky, his band giving it all one more time in a rare euphoric moment on this quite dark record.

“In spite of it all, life is beautiful”, Joe Talbot from IDLES screams from the top of his lungs in The End. Never has there been a better slogan to describe Captain Kaiser. Their music still celebrates life, only they know better than ever that life sometimes can kick you in the guts. One day you throw a party with friends, while the next there’s only the grim reaper on the dancefloor. Captain Kaiser gives them all their statues, only to break them down and throw them in the moshpit.