Review Summary: And we all know how you lived...
It’s not lost on me the irony of a mathrock band as technically and musically proficient as Snooze releasing their new album on 4/4. The group has built their ascending staircase of legitimacy and fame on the dichotomy of their coy, self-professed “happy heavy mathrock” moniker underselling the sheer depth and intellect of their product. As groovy as their music is, the band has always expertly, and perhaps surreptitiously, weaved threads of angst and moodiness throughout their previous albums that has connected with listeners in surprising but welcoming ways. Snooze has proven their ability to find this balance between their chunky math rock and emotive stylings thematically as well as musically in the past, a skill the group dials to 11 and absolutely nails in their latest offering
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE.
In many ways,
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE feels like a sort of reintroduction to the band. After the sudden and tragic death of bassist Cameron Grom begetting the group’s previous offering
Still,
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE sees the band with renewed focus and shifting into new musical arenas while keeping their oeuvre very much intact. Snooze has always thrived on their exemplary rhythmic chops and has started everyone of their previous albums with a bang, but not here. With the choral opener “I existed” and acoustic-focused first half of “Expectation,” the group chooses to ease the listener into the album’s experience. Fortunately, like the rest of the group’s musical experiments on the album, Snooze never get lost in them, utilizing them solely to buttress their sound. This restraint becomes glaringly evident when the album really kicks off with “Harked,” an Ultrapop influenced joint that displays the biggest changes with Snooze, harsh vocals and blast beats.
Before you roll your eyes,
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE is not a metalcore album and Snooze did not jump the shark and become a metalcore band. What “Harked” does is showcase an idea, one of many, that the group introduces throughout the runtime of
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE. As fiercely as the slab of distorted noise in “Harked” hits the listener is as smoothly Snooze melts it into the runtime of the rest of the song, transitioning into “Without” so effortlessly that you almost forget it happened. This is a theme at pervades the entire album and is accomplished due to the real reason
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE succeeds so thoroughly, the group’s mastery of rhythm.
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE is a masterclass in varied and interesting rhythmic instrumentation. On album highlight, “On a Superposition” the group is at their peak inventiveness, eschewing the album’s -core tendencies in favor of the group’s signature polyrhythmic drivers that are both technically brilliant and ridiculously catchy. Lead guitarist/vocalist Logan Voss’s vocal melodies both syncopate and diverge with the instrumentation in a way that captures the listener’s attention without breaking them from the pulse of the groove that shifts no less than 3 times without that jarring feeling a less musically inclined group might yield. Snooze’s songwriting ability in stitching these songs together creates an almost unrelenting flow and pacing that simultaneously never gets stale. Songs like “I Listened”, “A Mysterious Voice”, and “Expectation” are full of tempo changes and structural transitions yet never come across as having delineated acts like the “heavy” part, or the “somber” part, or the “melodious” part.
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE is a wonderful listening experience, filled with rhythmic brilliance, technical expertise, and imagination. The group’s lean towards their heavier inclinations is a welcome addition that Snooze tempers well with what the group terms their “musical silliness”. I like to think them keeping this silliness intact is a type of tribute to their late bassist which again betrays their image as merely a “happy heavy mathrock band.”
I KNOW HOW YOU WILL DIE shows us that Snooze has whimsy, but they also have depth. And they might be waiting for us to notice.
