Album number eight from the band now renowned for their genre-shifting and reinvention. Three years in the making, three producers in the studio, and twelve tracks long (given the band's penchant for Lost-esque symbolism, there's probably some deep significance to these numbers). What new style will be unveiled with Crash Love?
Nothing too thrilling, is the answer. Opener "Torch Song" is anthemic enough, particularly in its haunting choral refrain, but its sleek maneuvering can't quite give it the epic feel of older cuts like "Wester" or "6 to 8," or even Sing the Sorrow's "This Time Imperfect." Frontman Davey Havok's vocals are passionate but not as powerful as older outings, with the screaming of 2006's Decemberunderground notably missing.
Tonally, the guitars veer a little too close to that radio rock sound, unlike 2003's Sing the Sorrow, which saw Jade Puget firmly carve his own name into his distortion sound. The bass is fairly repetitive throughout, with several songs cutting most of the guitar out for verses, leaving Hunter Burgan's brooding lines left to fill the sonic landscape. We're treated to some fretboard wizardry and the odd drum flourish, reminding us that these guys have the chops as well as the looks.
"Too Shy to Scream" kicks off with a drumbeat that's half Donkey Kong, half hand-claps, but it's a refreshing rhythmic change from the rest of proceedings. Tracks like this, and lead single "Medicate" prove just how much the East Bay boys have learned about crafting catchy pop hooks, and "Veronica Sawyer Smokes" is a heartening 80's-influenced tune that owes at least part of its jangly sound to Johnny Marr – a standout. Unfortunately, other tracks seem to blend together, with odd riffs standing out but others vaguely sharing space as the record progresses.
Lyrically, Havok follows a similar narrative storytelling mode to previous record Decemberunderground, this time sprinkling both track names and verses with "my dear's" and "darling's." The clunky chorus of "Medicate" - "Medicate / Here with me / Now as we / Lose ourselves" - isn't his best songwriting, although the less chart-oriented material on Crash Love offers us fresh perspectives into the singer's headspace. "Sacrilege" is a fairly juvenile "atheist anthem" giving us Dawkins-namechecking one liners like "You venerate delusion based in hate."
The latter half of the record fizzles out somewhat, with a couple of mid-tempo numbers that plod along dully until the record ends just after forty-three minutes (with a bassline that's almost borrowed from Hendrix's "Hey Joe"). The band's second consecutive album to end without a hidden secret track after the final listed song, it just seems to come to a halt, uncertain of where to go next.
The band themselves have hailed this record as the album of their career, with Havok claiming that it will be the one the band are remembered for. It seems a shame, however, to discount some of their much stronger past material in favor of this, a well-produced and eagerly aimed (soon to be) bestseller, albeit one that retreads ground already covered by the band's much weaker peers in years gone by.
