OK, a note before the review: it seems like …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead and Explosions in the Sky are in a constant contest of dueling long pretentious titles. I'm declaring Explosions the winner. Of course, some of this might have to do with the fact that I am horrendously biased since I think the latter of the two bands still writes good songs. Still, they win the imaginary contest I just made up. On with the review.
How do you revise history? Explosions in the Sky have been unwittingly preparing to answer this question for years. They experimented, reread, rewrote and came up with their answer. It doesn't matter that All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone is loaded with the same tricks that peppered their previous albums—loaded drums, loud to quiet ratios being overly defined and sweet effect-dripped guitar laying around like a coiled snake ready to strike. There are no surprises, save a beautiful and affected piano song at the end that sounds like it was a not quite ready for primetime riff from the Rescue project. Much like I wanted, the parts fit together seamlessly while the songs themselves are really just extensions of the same painful ring of untold storyline and undiscovered perfection that made me listen in the first place.
This isn't to say the album is flawless. The sound, recording process and overall wholeness and fullness are perfect, yes, but the fact that the old tricks are reprised in a new package does not escape me, but as I've revealed before, I'm not into change nearly as much as I'm into improvement. I do think this is an improvement in some ways ("So Long, Lonesome" and "It's Natural to Be Afraid" being prime examples of new and old Explosions in the Sky ideas falling into place together). I also think it is a step backwards in others—a project full of unexpected beauty and understandable reticence—what do you change about yourselves when you've created a masterpiece (The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place)? What happens when you publish your experiment (The Rescue)? What happens next when you are so adept at recording the past greatness?
What happens is All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone—an album of beautiful sound but lacking in powerful moments. I'm sold, so I don't mind. Others may disapprove, but I challenge them to differentiate this sound without aping Mogwai or adding to a group with incredible and indelible chemistry. I challenge them to rewrite history from a standpoint that has never been read.
How do you rewrite history? You tell the same story from a different angle is all. You don't change the outcome; you view the events from different angles. In this case, All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone is the album that views the same tune from a different perspective. There's nothing wrong with that, per se, but it is painful to already know what happens. Needless to say, Explosions in the Sky have revisionist noise down pat. |