“Kino” — Swedish for “cinema” — is the perfect title for the new single from Kallsup. The band out of Örebro — who we’ve featured quite a few times here — released the track in May along with a colorful music video, and we were so transfixed by both that it took us a bit to process our thoughts.
The new song is the first from their upcoming album Alldeles för nära (or Way Too Close), which comes out this fall. It captures the band in their most charged-up state: Throughout 2025, the six-piece crew released their debut album, played a packed hometown release show, went on a whirlwind autumn tour, and played a sold-out show at the venue Slaktkyrkan in Stockholm before Christmas. While that seems like a lot, it didn’t stop Kallsup from getting back to work. They went right into the studio to kick off 2026, and “Kino” is the first result from those sessions.
Kallsup picks up on “Kino” where they left off on Alldeles för nära: Driving beats with shoegaze vibes reaching into goth territory, reminiscent of the louder fare from The Cure. Eline Gustafsson’s vocals build from quiet melody to a force of nature, atop the shimmering and scorching guitars of both Edwin Karolczak and Carl Libert. The rhythm of the song is relentless, a group effort between William Ulff on bass, Elin Lindström Svernby on synth, and Joakim Jakobsson on drums.
In the song, Gustafsson sings of struggling to balance reality and fiction, identity, expectations to conform, and overall confusion. The music video showcases this through intense and reflective visuals: Dazzling lights and shifting colors blur the band members’ faces, and one by one all of them turns away except for Gustafsson, symbolizing isolation. The final shot is of Gustaffson standing empty woods with tall trees looming like walls. To quote the song’s title, the shot — and video overall — is quite cinematic. But then again, so is life: Playing roles, putting on new faces, and wondering who we are when other people aren’t watching.
Take a look at the video for “Kino” below, and look out for more from Kallsup in the next few months before the release of Alldeles för nära.
Written by Will Sisskind
