Review Summary: The depths of outer space are mighty cold, yet there are still so many wondrous sights to behold.
It’s hard for me to fault anyone for their ambition alone. Personally, I find it charming when an artist or band sets out to create a lavish, largescale body of work and does manage to take their first steps in such a bold direction. To say that Starset possess ambition would be a stunning understatement. It’s not terribly often I come across modern rock that is as epic, if not grandiloquent to some, as any given Hans Zimmer film score. It’s here that I came to love this first transmission from the Starset Society.
On one hand,
Transmissions is an album that is better than the sum of its parts. If you were to take each individual aspect of their sound and scrutinize it, you’d find yourself unimpressed with what each isolated fragment offers. Yet their debut succeeds through synergy. By themselves, the guitar riffs are oftentimes uninspiring yet serviceable. Likewise, too, the lyrics, are also comparably utilitarian in presentation. When looked at individually, each separate aspect isn’t all that extraordinary or inspirational. Each has been done before many times over. It’s only when combined do all these assorted facets truly shine like starts in the night sky.
This combined effort is best exemplified on tracks like “It Has Begun” and “Point of No Return”. The myriad elements exhibited here really come together and crystallize in this swelling exchange of delicate keyboards, sputtering synthesizers, and robust orchestration. Only by bolstering the post-grunge backbone with an imposing wall of sound does their particular brand of electronic rock really take flight. It may all amount to throwing everything but the kitchen sink into the production, but in the end, this tactic undoubtedly suits their style and approach.
Transmissions is both a very busy and very cold modern rock record. Even though the lyrics touch upon universal topics with regard to pain and loss, the cold, electronic textures create a chilly, almost impersonal atmosphere that helped keep me at arm’s length. Even when vocalist Dustin Bates yearns for love and dreams of a better, brighter tomorrow, I still feel like some thick glass wall segregates the two of us. And this inherent separation kept me from connecting with him on a truly visceral level. It also doesn’t help that most songs consist of long outros that do little else but bind the record’s opaque concept from track to track. They’re not all that nettlesome, but they don’t really add much of anything in the grand scheme either.
Thankfully, the album is well-balanced with one accessible single after the other. If anything, this should help distract most from the chilling disconnect. It’s with this accessibility that Starset make the divide feel more bearable. Numerous songs like “Halo”, “Carnivore” and “My Demons” feel as if they were specifically engineered to triumph on terrestrial radio. Yet the coldness of outer space, so frequently epitomized on pretty much every other track, isn’t as prevailing here even when the frosty timbre is, nevertheless, ubiquitous. It does become impossible to ignore it when a ballad like “Telescope” or “Dark On Me” pushes the lush and reserved nature of their music well into the foreground.
Ultimately, I probably loved this album more than I should, but in my mind,
Transmissions represents the remarkable first steps of a modern rock band on a meteoric rise to success and stardom. And even when the individual facets of the instrumentation don’t excite me by themselves, once I step back to admire the view, I become amazed with the larger picture on display. The depths of outer space are mighty cold, but there are still so many wondrous sights to behold.
