Thrice
The Alchemy Index Vol I-IV
2007/2008 Vagrant
6/10, 4/10, 3/10, 6.5/10
5/10 overall
As a reviewer, I feel that I must lay my biases out on the table.
I used to like Thrice.
Now, don't use this to place me into a stereotype prematurely. I am not one of those "Thrice used to RAWK, and now they make wuss music" idiots. If anything, my reasons for placing my appreciation for Thrice in the past tense tend towards the opposite. As frequently happens during that landmark time of transition between high school and college, many of your tastes are reevaluated in light of your advancing years and growing appreciation for things of greater subtlety and maturity. Thrice's work simply did not fare well under this kind of scrutiny. They were an excellent band at relating to the passions of my youth, but I simply grew beyond those sentiments. I did, however maintain a curiousity about Thrice. Their final album of my high school days, Vheissu, had showed some interesting progression into musical territory that I was also just beginning to explore at the time. I was therefore interested to find out if they would mature as I matured. When The Alchemy Index was announced, 4 discs, each exploring one of the "elements" sonically, I was intrigued by the premise, and wondered if perhaps this was a sign that Thrice and I were on the same progression musically, and that while their past releases would always be relegated to my high school experience, their future might still be as a band that I could identify with.
Hope is a dangerous beast.
Anyways, you don't really care about my high school experiences. What you want to hear about is the music.
Vol I. Fire
Thrice reach straight for the obvious in their exploration of Fire as an element, framing the Fire disc as a hard rock album. In many ways it bears similarity to their past work, but with less of a necessity for sheer speed and riffage. This plays out interestingly, and the disc works primarily because it crafts a vision of post-harcore (at times the disc approaches, but never quite IS metal) that manages to be a fairly unique take on the genre. The disc builds on previous strengths well, but notably falters in a few places. Firebreather Is very much rooted in the Vheissu playbook, with the interesting twist of being just a few BPM slower than a song of its type normally would be, creating an almost awkward feeling on the first few listens that fades over time. While many might classify this as a weakness, I found the choice intriguing enough to drag this song out of the classification of being a simple rehash of older ideas. The Messenger starts off with an interesting, almost glitch-pop beat, but this intrigue quickly fades as the song degenerates into a rather obvious (and notably more boring) rehash of ideas from The Artist in the Amulance. Backdraft finds the band stretching their wings a bit further with some eerie acoustic guitar noodling and whispered, double-tracked vocals. The song resolves into a somewhat lackluster chorus, but the spookiness of the verses more than makes up for this weakness. The Arsonist edges dangerously close to being metal, and the flirtation results in probably the strongest track on the album. The rest of the track again supports a disappointing chorus, but much less so than Backdraft. Burn The Fleet, like Firebreather, feels like a page torn from the Vheissu playbook, but instead of making up for this by twisting the formula like the former track, Burn The Fleet makes up for it by simply being a much stronger track, melodically, than most of Vheissu was. The song boasts a chorus so epic that it borders on self-parody, but in the end its hook vastly overpowers it's cheese factor. The disc closes with The Flame Deluge, the first of the four disc-closers which end on the same chorus melody, framed in the style of each disc. The track starts hard, nasty and noisy, and resolves into an airy and beautiful chorus (the common portion on each disc). The juxtaposition works wonderfully, and the track rivals The Arsonist in sheer strength.
6/10
Vol II. Water
This disc stands in polar opposite to Fire, both thematically (and therefore sonically) and in quality. Where Fire is an overall well put together disc with some definite moments where the band falters, Water is a disc that fails, but occasionally fails well. Heavy with Rhodes pianos, tape loops, and samples, the disc is an obvious grasp towards more experimental waters, using Radiohead's Kid A as an ideological touchstone. The reason the disc falls on its face is because Thrice's reach exceeds their grasp. While in love with the idea of experimental pop music, they fail to truly stretch themselves and end up falling in a gap between accessibility and experimentation that can't be appreciated as pop, but does not ring true as art either. Album opener Digital Sea sums up the pretensions of the disc, with a Rhodes riff that wishes it was Everthing In It's Right Place by Radiohead, but only serves as a touchpoint for an juvenile melody and syrupy strings. The melodic issues of the track illustrate perhaps the primary weakness of Thrice's more melodic material- (lead singer) Dustin Kenrue's melodies wield all the sublety of a T-Rex rampaging through a shopping mall. Open Water continues the proceedings. Not as horrendous as Digital Sea, the track manages not to offend so much as bore, until a decently pretty chorus takes over. Unfortunately, the chorus cannot quite overpower the numbness of the rest of the song. Lost Continent follows in similar sleepiness, but builds much more effectively into a melodically interesting dirge. Night Diving is an attempt at post-rock, but is ultimately more Explosions in the Sky than Mogwai; that is to say it is extremely repetitive and goes almost nowhere. Slowly. And blandly. The Whaler follows: another sleepy, forgettable track. The album closes with Kings Upon The Main, the build to the same closing melody as the other 3 discs. Arguably the weakest of the 4 renditions, the songs starts of with a slow, reverb heavy piano march that continues longer than it has any right to, before reaching the closing common chorus.
4/10
Vol III. Air
Air was the disc met with the most anticipation on my part. While the other elements had seemingly obvious ways to represent themselves sonically, this one seemed like the most ambitious idea, and had the fewest preconcieved connotation in my mind. Within 30 seconds of the beginning of the first track, my hopes were dashed. Easily the worst of the four discs, I don't think I can dignify it with a track by track review. Air is an album full of embarrasingly trite melodies and almost 80s-ish guitar lines. Opener Broken Lungs typifies the proceedings with cloying vocals and a vomit-inducing punk ballad guitar. These elements continue on track after track. Of particular derision are the Guns and Roses balladry of Daedalus's guitar and the plodding As the Crow Flies. Suddenly, however, the wall to wall torment is broken by Silver Wings, the disc's closer. Silver Wings is everything I hoped for in these discs, beautiful and sparse. Clocking in at just over 2 minutes, the song understays its welcome, as a whole album could have (and should have, in the case of Air) been composed around its sound. Silver Wings also carries the most effective use of the common chorus ending of the four discs. Silver Wings is the only reason this disc does not fall squarely into the 0-2 range.
3/10
Vol IV. Earth
Earth is easily the strongest of the 4 disc, which is ironic because of its similarities to Dustin's solo album, which has met much derision from me. The disc somehow avoids the juvenile melodies of the other discs, and the album's organic nature nullifies the overproduction present in Dustin's vocals on the other discs. Moving Mountains is an earthy, bluesy dip into Americana, lamenting in classic blues form "I don't know the first thing about love." While framing the lament in the midst of darker, more spiritual ponderings rather than "girl issues." Digging My Own Grave incorporates simultaneously gorgeous and ominous jazz piano beautifully. The Earth isn't Humming, a cover of progressive outfit Frodus, is a weak spot in that it does not improve on the original and it's time signature idiosyncrasies seem out of place in the context of a rootsier disc, but the song would probably sound much stronger removed from the rest of the material on Earth. The Lion and the Wolf digs right back into the ominous piano-based lament of Digging My Own Grave. Little choral samples here and there add a distinctive lacing to an otherwise indistinct, but pretty, track. Come All You Weary serves both as the obvious single and the disc's weakest track, showcasing the generically "spiritual" lyrics of the rest of the project, and inviting back in the comically obvious melodies of the other discs. It is perhaps no coincidence that this comes on the only track on which the band allowed themselves to use electric instruments and standard production instead of completely acoustic instruments. Child of Dust serves as a fitting closer, finding the band exploring acoustic studio techniques such as moving the microphone during recording (in this case into a box) to create sonic effects instead of tampering digitally later. The disc closes on the common chorus once again.
6.5/10
In the end, while Thrice has unquestionably grown up much as I have in their listening habits and goals, they do not seem to have the talent at crafting grown-up melodies and sentiments that they did at high school ones. Perhaps time and further growth are needed, but at this point I am increasingly ready to close the book on Thrice.
2007/2008 Vagrant
6/10, 4/10, 3/10, 6.5/10
5/10 overall
As a reviewer, I feel that I must lay my biases out on the table.
I used to like Thrice.
Now, don't use this to place me into a stereotype prematurely. I am not one of those "Thrice used to RAWK, and now they make wuss music" idiots. If anything, my reasons for placing my appreciation for Thrice in the past tense tend towards the opposite. As frequently happens during that landmark time of transition between high school and college, many of your tastes are reevaluated in light of your advancing years and growing appreciation for things of greater subtlety and maturity. Thrice's work simply did not fare well under this kind of scrutiny. They were an excellent band at relating to the passions of my youth, but I simply grew beyond those sentiments. I did, however maintain a curiousity about Thrice. Their final album of my high school days, Vheissu, had showed some interesting progression into musical territory that I was also just beginning to explore at the time. I was therefore interested to find out if they would mature as I matured. When The Alchemy Index was announced, 4 discs, each exploring one of the "elements" sonically, I was intrigued by the premise, and wondered if perhaps this was a sign that Thrice and I were on the same progression musically, and that while their past releases would always be relegated to my high school experience, their future might still be as a band that I could identify with.
Hope is a dangerous beast.
Anyways, you don't really care about my high school experiences. What you want to hear about is the music.
Vol I. Fire
Thrice reach straight for the obvious in their exploration of Fire as an element, framing the Fire disc as a hard rock album. In many ways it bears similarity to their past work, but with less of a necessity for sheer speed and riffage. This plays out interestingly, and the disc works primarily because it crafts a vision of post-harcore (at times the disc approaches, but never quite IS metal) that manages to be a fairly unique take on the genre. The disc builds on previous strengths well, but notably falters in a few places. Firebreather Is very much rooted in the Vheissu playbook, with the interesting twist of being just a few BPM slower than a song of its type normally would be, creating an almost awkward feeling on the first few listens that fades over time. While many might classify this as a weakness, I found the choice intriguing enough to drag this song out of the classification of being a simple rehash of older ideas. The Messenger starts off with an interesting, almost glitch-pop beat, but this intrigue quickly fades as the song degenerates into a rather obvious (and notably more boring) rehash of ideas from The Artist in the Amulance. Backdraft finds the band stretching their wings a bit further with some eerie acoustic guitar noodling and whispered, double-tracked vocals. The song resolves into a somewhat lackluster chorus, but the spookiness of the verses more than makes up for this weakness. The Arsonist edges dangerously close to being metal, and the flirtation results in probably the strongest track on the album. The rest of the track again supports a disappointing chorus, but much less so than Backdraft. Burn The Fleet, like Firebreather, feels like a page torn from the Vheissu playbook, but instead of making up for this by twisting the formula like the former track, Burn The Fleet makes up for it by simply being a much stronger track, melodically, than most of Vheissu was. The song boasts a chorus so epic that it borders on self-parody, but in the end its hook vastly overpowers it's cheese factor. The disc closes with The Flame Deluge, the first of the four disc-closers which end on the same chorus melody, framed in the style of each disc. The track starts hard, nasty and noisy, and resolves into an airy and beautiful chorus (the common portion on each disc). The juxtaposition works wonderfully, and the track rivals The Arsonist in sheer strength.
6/10
Vol II. Water
This disc stands in polar opposite to Fire, both thematically (and therefore sonically) and in quality. Where Fire is an overall well put together disc with some definite moments where the band falters, Water is a disc that fails, but occasionally fails well. Heavy with Rhodes pianos, tape loops, and samples, the disc is an obvious grasp towards more experimental waters, using Radiohead's Kid A as an ideological touchstone. The reason the disc falls on its face is because Thrice's reach exceeds their grasp. While in love with the idea of experimental pop music, they fail to truly stretch themselves and end up falling in a gap between accessibility and experimentation that can't be appreciated as pop, but does not ring true as art either. Album opener Digital Sea sums up the pretensions of the disc, with a Rhodes riff that wishes it was Everthing In It's Right Place by Radiohead, but only serves as a touchpoint for an juvenile melody and syrupy strings. The melodic issues of the track illustrate perhaps the primary weakness of Thrice's more melodic material- (lead singer) Dustin Kenrue's melodies wield all the sublety of a T-Rex rampaging through a shopping mall. Open Water continues the proceedings. Not as horrendous as Digital Sea, the track manages not to offend so much as bore, until a decently pretty chorus takes over. Unfortunately, the chorus cannot quite overpower the numbness of the rest of the song. Lost Continent follows in similar sleepiness, but builds much more effectively into a melodically interesting dirge. Night Diving is an attempt at post-rock, but is ultimately more Explosions in the Sky than Mogwai; that is to say it is extremely repetitive and goes almost nowhere. Slowly. And blandly. The Whaler follows: another sleepy, forgettable track. The album closes with Kings Upon The Main, the build to the same closing melody as the other 3 discs. Arguably the weakest of the 4 renditions, the songs starts of with a slow, reverb heavy piano march that continues longer than it has any right to, before reaching the closing common chorus.
4/10
Vol III. Air
Air was the disc met with the most anticipation on my part. While the other elements had seemingly obvious ways to represent themselves sonically, this one seemed like the most ambitious idea, and had the fewest preconcieved connotation in my mind. Within 30 seconds of the beginning of the first track, my hopes were dashed. Easily the worst of the four discs, I don't think I can dignify it with a track by track review. Air is an album full of embarrasingly trite melodies and almost 80s-ish guitar lines. Opener Broken Lungs typifies the proceedings with cloying vocals and a vomit-inducing punk ballad guitar. These elements continue on track after track. Of particular derision are the Guns and Roses balladry of Daedalus's guitar and the plodding As the Crow Flies. Suddenly, however, the wall to wall torment is broken by Silver Wings, the disc's closer. Silver Wings is everything I hoped for in these discs, beautiful and sparse. Clocking in at just over 2 minutes, the song understays its welcome, as a whole album could have (and should have, in the case of Air) been composed around its sound. Silver Wings also carries the most effective use of the common chorus ending of the four discs. Silver Wings is the only reason this disc does not fall squarely into the 0-2 range.
3/10
Vol IV. Earth
Earth is easily the strongest of the 4 disc, which is ironic because of its similarities to Dustin's solo album, which has met much derision from me. The disc somehow avoids the juvenile melodies of the other discs, and the album's organic nature nullifies the overproduction present in Dustin's vocals on the other discs. Moving Mountains is an earthy, bluesy dip into Americana, lamenting in classic blues form "I don't know the first thing about love." While framing the lament in the midst of darker, more spiritual ponderings rather than "girl issues." Digging My Own Grave incorporates simultaneously gorgeous and ominous jazz piano beautifully. The Earth isn't Humming, a cover of progressive outfit Frodus, is a weak spot in that it does not improve on the original and it's time signature idiosyncrasies seem out of place in the context of a rootsier disc, but the song would probably sound much stronger removed from the rest of the material on Earth. The Lion and the Wolf digs right back into the ominous piano-based lament of Digging My Own Grave. Little choral samples here and there add a distinctive lacing to an otherwise indistinct, but pretty, track. Come All You Weary serves both as the obvious single and the disc's weakest track, showcasing the generically "spiritual" lyrics of the rest of the project, and inviting back in the comically obvious melodies of the other discs. It is perhaps no coincidence that this comes on the only track on which the band allowed themselves to use electric instruments and standard production instead of completely acoustic instruments. Child of Dust serves as a fitting closer, finding the band exploring acoustic studio techniques such as moving the microphone during recording (in this case into a box) to create sonic effects instead of tampering digitally later. The disc closes on the common chorus once again.
6.5/10
In the end, while Thrice has unquestionably grown up much as I have in their listening habits and goals, they do not seem to have the talent at crafting grown-up melodies and sentiments that they did at high school ones. Perhaps time and further growth are needed, but at this point I am increasingly ready to close the book on Thrice.
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