“You’re on your way to a new day while I’m far behind.“
In 2016, Touché Amoré dropped their landmark album Stage Four. Written while dealing with the recent loss of frontman Jeremy Bohm‘s mother, it holds incredibly heavy emotional weight while also exploring new territory for the band, making for a tight yet wide-ranging journey of devastation and trying to move forward. An album with this level of vision and execution proves rare, of course. The subsequent challenge for the band: try not to live in the wake of Stage Four. They followed it up with a re-recording of their debut, then the solid but more forgettable Lament.
New album Spiral In A Straight Line seeks a somewhat different approach. Described by Bohm as about “different kind of grief”, touched on before but taking center stage here. In trying to escape the shadow of Stage Four, we might expect some significant stylistic changes, and opener “Nobody’s” signals the direction:
“So we’ll grieve in a forward direction,
Neck in neck and side by side,
As I fixate on the road ahead,
It just winds and winds and winds and winds.“
Opening up with an oddly bright riff, the music itself otherwise sounds quite familiar. The band’s style of emo-tinged post-hardcore lands as well here as anywhere. Immediately, this track seems to be from the perspective of someone within a breakup, or at least the final stages leading up to one. Familiar territory, but Touché Amoré can pull off conviction as well as anyone. Subsequently, “Disasters” picks up the pace, demonstrating more anger than anguish. The album generally mirrors the ups and downs one would face in this period, with each track taking a different look.
“A misguided Hal Ashby catastrophe,
Not exactly something you plan to be.
You gotta handle it gracefully.“
“Hal Ashby”, on the other hand, sounds more like desperation. One of only two singles released in promotion of Spiral In A Straight Line, the band did not want to tip their hand too much. With that said, these are two of the strongest numbers here. “Hal Ashby” acts as a foil to the following “Force Of Habit” in the same way the first two did. This kind of whiplash serves to strengthen the overarching theme and associated emotions. Naturally, it compresses the timeline into a tight 32 minutes, but we essentially cover the stages of grief.
“Mezzanine” / “Altitude” are another such pair. The former features one of Bohm‘s strongest performances in particular, especially at the brief chorus. “Will you suspend belief in me,” he begs, and I mean begs, to great effect. Longtime fans have heard this before, which might prove the biggest complaint I have. With that said, “Altitude” builds atmosphere in a new way, especially right before the Spiral In A Straight Line drop. At the album’s halfway point, a short interlude offers a brief reprieve from the turmoil.
Taken as the whole, the second half arguably does hold a bit less staying power. By track seven, the album has shown most of its tricks, though all remain executed with extreme competence. “This Routine” and “Finalist” offer another perspective of the together/alone dynamic. One highlight in the ladder is Bohm yelping “Will I get used to this?” Otherwise, this set marks the low point, the least interesting material before breaking the formula with the last three.
The first of two features appear here in Dinosaur Jr.‘s Lou Barlow on “Subversion”. Accordingly, it has the first glimpse of clean vocals on the album, plus the great feature itself. In having an uneven number of songs, it had to break the mold, and it continues with “The Glue”. Here the perspective shifts to the overview of the relationship, feeling itself like a bit of a closer. Thematically most connected to “Nobody’s“, it acts more retrospectively than the rest of the album, which existed largely in medias res.
Closer “Goodbye For Now” is both the sendoff and the payoff for Spiral In A Straight Line. It functions like two songs stitched together before being layers atop each other, with the second half arguably the best single segment of the album. Julien Baker returns for her third feature in as many albums for Touché Amoré. Her voice on the bridge and picking up in the background of the chorus sounds down right ethereal, especially juxtaposed to Bohm‘s typical rasp.
Spiral In A Straight Line thus closes its story well, even if not entirely resolved. Given the emotional weight of the album, this type of ending feels just. While it does not serve to redefine the band in any significant way, it does prove a solid addition to a great catalogue. Its internal conflict provides the fuel to keep it interesting and it sticks the landing. Stage Four it is not, but that’s to its benefit and credit.
8/10
Touché Amoré – Spiral In A Straight Line comes out this Friday, October 11 on Rise Records with pre-orders here.