I’m walking – sitting – into this review a little conflicted. I’ve mused on expectations and all that before, I don’t wish to retread it much, but the core of this review, and by proxy my enjoyment of this album, is based on what I would reasonably expect from a band and how they willfully, purposefully subvert that without trying to in a literal sense. Sugar Horse exude the kind of cheeky self-awareness they’ve come to be known for right out the gate: ‘This album was intended to be a sideways step. A move away from the kind of thing that is expected of us… if anything is at all‘. Reading that is reassuring to me, like I’m not fucking losing it for feeling how I feel about The Grand Scheme of Things, which is conflicted if you weren’t paying attention earlier.
The other part of the above quote is the band wished to challenge themselves and make songs that ‘get to the point‘ quicker without doing the same thing they’ve done – ‘We’d much prefer to make it difficult and take the long route‘. That’s fair, admirable even. This immediately makes The Grand Scheme of Things confrontational, at least for someone like me who really loved The Live Long After, an explosive debut that married massive post-, gazy soundscapes and emotionality with an almost stoner metal devotion to melody and nuance on many songs. Oh, and funny song titles. It was fun, but also endearing. The Grand Scheme of Things doesn’t seem very enamored with either of those things anymore.
I don’t mean for what I’ve said so far to be perceived as wholly negative. There’s a lot I like about this new album. First off, some of the song titles still hit – “The Shape Of ASMR To Come”, “Jefferson Aeroplane Over The Sea”, and “Office Job Simulator” are my favorites. Musically, the singles “Spit Beach” and “New Dead Elvis” are some of the most immediately poignant. “New Dead Elvis” is the shortest song on an album filled with mostly short songs, at least compared to previous work. The vocals are impassioned, the lyrics biting and visceral:
‘Have we failed?
‘Cause I can’t decide
Although the evidence points to our demise
So bring nails
For this season’s Christ
Go down in history and worth the ticket price‘
There’s a nice, rupturing rhythm to the more energetic parts of the track, simple yet effective. It’s one of those songs where the emotion carries it through to the end. “Spit Beach” is similar, but less abrupt. It builds to its destruction, defiantly dropping all the pieces to the floor to watch them rebound and crash against each other, a true sonic sundering that happens over and over for its four-and-a-half minutes.
One of the closest moments we get to vintage (can I use that term for a band not even ten years old?) Sugar Horse is “Mulletproof”, an evaporative track that soon gives way to a combative, angry end. It’s sat near the middle of the album and feels like a turning point within it. Another nostalgic (again, can I?) moment is “Corpsing” which is more wholesale gazy post-rock with anthemic vocals and movement that feels well-earned – all it’s missing is the riffs, but there is a nice melody at the end that’s strong.
I’d love “Space Tourist” as an ender for The Grand Scheme of Things if it were more concise or maybe deliberate. It’s a few minutes of touching, delicate music with more isolated vocals than we get elsewhere on the album, returning to a more shoegazed mentality, before a rough, destitute, heavy interlude bridges that part with about twenty minutes (20!) of unmitigated, constant crescendoing with guitar noise that creeps in over time. It’s abrasive in length if not tone and I’m certain thematically important – the album plays with themes of God, religion, and death, and for the end of the album to be this, and only this, has to tie into that. My best guess is, given the album’s final lyrics and overall themes, the last twenty minutes might represent a transition to, or maybe from, a death-like state or a rebirth into a samsara-like cycle where the album loops and begins anew. On the surface though, this end feels empty and overly extended.
The Grand Scheme of Things just feels woefully burdened. It’s like it’s actively reckoning with something, undaunted and without pause in how it conveys emotion. It’s not entirely made to be digestible or approachable like older Sugar Horse music – in fact, it’s almost a cry for help. It’s dark and dreary, but in a vastly different way. I’m not in love with it, I think that much is clear, but it’s still worth investigating, interrogating its moods and changes like a concerned friend. While it’s not the biggest jump in sound bands are capable of, it’s enough to render it off-putting in a very specific way that makes you not want to look away. I have so many questions, very little answers, and I just hope the band are doing okay mentally at the end of it all because even I as a listener feel drained after experiencing where they are at this time.
