Every now and again, an album drops onto the scene that floors you from the get-go. An album that makes you drop everything you’re doing just to give it your full attention. An album that makes you say out loud, either to your friends or to yourself: “holy shit.”
Soul Blind’s sophomore album, Red Sky Mourning, is not just one of these albums. It is a reminder of everything this genre can be at its best; thirty-four minutes of evidence that nu metal doesn’t just belong in this modern era, it thrives.
The album kicks off with a supermassive bang in "Business or Pleasure," a track that instantly dispels any nerves the group may have about a sophomore slump. “It’s in my way / but am I wrong? / It’s in my head and in my soul” Cen sings; a fitting start to a track list that throttles full steam ahead, never pumping on the brakes so much as occasionally laying off the gas.
One of the most prominent feats of Red Sky Mourning is just how seamless it is. "Business or Pleasure" – a song strong enough to be the highlight of any other album – fades perfectly into "Dyno," an equally explosive track that elevates everything laid bare by its predecessor. (On an album loaded with some of the nastiest riffs of the year, Dyno is a major competitor for the nastiest.) From "Dyno," we reach "Hide Your Evil," which eases into the delightfully shoegazey "Mistake to Wonder." The album ebbs and flows this way throughout: their most hardcore impulses fading into their softest ones, blending beautifully, contrasting even better. If you’re not listening closely, you’ll reach the final track without realizing the time has passed at all.
The midway point, "For Real," is only a lull because everything preceding it is so astonishingly great; but even at their most (relatively) mediocre, Soul Blind will give you something to write home about. On this one, it’s a sick opening drumbeat that may invoke "Maps" for the most millennial of listeners. The comparison to Yeah Yeah Yeahs starts and ends there, though, as this is still undeniably Soul Blind, and they’re not finished.
"Thru The Haze" is an electric start to the album’s third act, and one of the most vulnerable tracks throughout; a song that begins deceptively, with an initial riff-drum-collision that may be the ghost of turn-of-the-century Deftones. But it cools off from there, giving way to a cyclical, hypnotic chorus. Its twin, the title track "Red Sky Mourning," is not as strong, unfortunately suffering the same fate as "For Real"; an otherwise good song, sandwiched between better ones.
The good news about "Red Sky Mourning" being a less-than-exciting title track is that it is immediately followed by what could be the best songs of the album: "New York Smoke" and "Closer To You." Though the two are different in nearly every regard, they are a perfect final demonstration of Soul Blind’s range. Where "New York Smoke" is furious and charged, "Closer To You" is melancholic and patient, in no rush to prove anything else before the curtain falls.
It’s a beautiful, unexpected ending to an album that has only given itself brief spurts of breath before charging ahead. Here, it doesn’t sound like Soul Blind is gasping for breath so much as sighing in relief. They’ve laid it all out – the best they have in them. Now it’s done.
And it’s really, really good.
Red Sky Mourning is available now via Closed Casket Activities.
