Review Summary: Yeah, it's fine, I just wanna die.
If
Umbra was the completion of Grayscale’s metamorphosis from punk-tinged caterpillar origins to poppier butterfly pastures, then their middling follow-up
The Hart symbolizes an abrupt sniping and gulping mid-air by an ornery bird. While the latest full-length record from the Philadelphia quartet isn’t an outright tragedy of the animal kingdom, it is certainly a rockier affair, prone to stretches of uneven pacing, volatile songwriting, diminished production quality compared to previous efforts, and unfulfilling performances. Make no mistake, there are verifiable diamonds to be unearthed in this here rough, but the listener must be willing to endure that ROUGH with patience to arrive at their desired destination.
Let’s begin our observation of
The Hart’s muddied waters of quality by singling out its absolute muddiest aspect, the production. Producers Eric Palmquist and Danen Rector, as well as mix engineer Neal Avron, are concerningly preoccupied with distorting this album’s low end beyond recognition, as well as shoving it to the forefront of every song arrangement without care for how it will affect the rest of the sonic landscape. The difficulty curve of differentiating between aspects of the blaring and obscure instrumentals will be one of the first takeaways audiences glean from the opening duo of “Kept Me Alive” and “Through the Landslide”. The second will likely be that their streaming platform was not set to “repeat”, and that these indistinguishable wannabe anthems are indeed two separate compositions.
The Hart’s front half continues to suffer from these production snafus and uninspired songwriting offerings up through previously released singles “Let Go” and “Summer Clothes”. The former could
again be mistaken for a carbon copy of the first two tracks if not for its slower tempo, while the latter is a nefarious “Stacy’s Mom” cosplay that the CIA could effectively utilize to extract information out of just about anyone.
And then, miraculously,
The Hart manages to do a complete 180 with the back-to-back barnburners of “Some Kind of Magic” and “Dance With Your Ghost”. The mix remains an issue, but Grayscale manage to craft two genuine bangers here without channeling the robotic, emotionless performance style of the album’s opening act, and instead hearkening back to the layered and infectious approach that made
Umbra so addictive. It should be noted that with the exception of these two highlights and closer “Not Afraid to Die”, the slower, more contemplative tracks on this album tend to stick out more, for a highly troubling reason; they somehow manage to feel more energetic than the in-your-face rockers that are mastered to the point that they’re basically clipping. The genuinely touching tribute of “Mum II” cements itself as the emotional core of the record, while conveniently skirting around the disappointing trend of the tracklist containing subpar lyrical content. Acoustic number “Talking In My Sleep” emerges as the crown jewel of the album’s first half (despite its lyrical missteps) thanks to its infectious melodies and Colin Walsh’s strongest vocal performance on the entire project, while the rest of the band offer up some of their finest work on “Don’t Leave Me in the Dark”, perhaps because they were finally permitted to do something interesting every once in a while, particularly drummer Nick Veno.
The Hart is certainly engaging in small doses, and contains about three or four essential tracks that stand alongside the most brilliant in the Grayscale discography. However, the bulk of the record appears to represent a doubling down on the musical approach that defined
Umbra, while stripping it of most of its identity, playfulness, and sophistication. Those diamonds in the rough are still observable if one squints, but I’d personally prefer to spend my time doing something other than digging through the dirt.
