If their debut album was dour and bleak and bitter without the sweet, with some swirling swathes of noise, and their sophomore pushed brooding density to a level that was positively harrowing in places, then it was inevitable that The Twilight Sad would have to do something different again for album number three. Upping the racket wouldn’t really be a feasible option, not least of all because it would inevitably railroad them into a creative and sonic dead-end.
Of course, any substantial change of approach was always doing to require some digestion, ‘Sick’ certainly indicates that forthcoming album ‘No One Will Ever Know’ will be unlike either of its predecessors. To hear James Graham’s distinct and thickly accented vocals over jittery, flickering beats coupled with a backing that’s more like The Cure’s ‘Disintegration’, with spacious glacial keyboards to the fore and the guitars keeping their distance is bound to come as a shock to fans, and Stereogum’s description of the track as being “‘Knives Out’ gone Sad” is entirely fitting.
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But whereas, say, Editors’ shift into synth-based 80s revivalism was iffy at best, and served to highlight the band’s limitations, The Twilight Sad haven’t abandoned all of the things that won them their fans in the first place, and one thing’s for sure, they’ve not lightened the mood any. It might lack to the sonic impact of ‘I Became A Prostitute’, the lead single from ‘Forget the Night Ahead’, but ‘Sick’ isn’t short of intensity, and has the makings of a definite grower.
The Twilight Sad Online
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