Review: Chiodos - Devil
- Apr 4, 2014
- 3 min read
[Razor & Tie; 2014]
Rating: 5.5/10
By Zack Baker, Editorial Director
Key Tracks: “We’re Talking About Practice,” “Looking For A Tornado,” “Sunny Days & Hand Grenades”
There’s a very weird form of nostalgia that comes with music from one’s childhood. The last time I listened to a Chiodos album at release, I was an eighth-grader who had just discovered skinny jeans and desperately needed a haircut. And the second I hit play on Devil, I felt like I was back in those awkward days.
It’s a weird experience but not an altogether awful one. It’s nice to reminisce on those days, and think back to how much I’ve changed (I can finally talk to girls without shaking in fear!). I’ve grown up, but at the same time there are still parts of me that come directly from who I was all those years ago. Chiodos mirrors that sentiment here.
The vocals are better, the songwriting is tighter and the band hasn’t lost its knack for making the over-dramatic interesting. As soon as the piano starts to twinkle on “U.G. Introduction,” things feel right. Vocalist Craig Owens is back with the band, and when he belts out that first soaring note on “We’re Talking About Practice” it’s like he never left. For all the drama that’s happened within the band since Bone Palace Ballet, “We’re Talking About Practice” could sit comfortably alongside any of the songs on that album.
Chiodos has always operated in hard swings, ever-thrashing back-and-forth between the gentle and the violent. It became the band’s trademark with “Baby, You Wouldn’t Last A Minute On The Creek” way back on All’s Well That Ends Well, and they still squeeze as much of the formula as possible nine years after the fact. If there’s one thing Devil nails, it’s recreating that vibe and making it more drastic than ever before.
The swings in each song make them fluid and dynamic, but Devil unfortunately translates the abrupt shifts to the track listing as well. At its best, the album is reminding listeners of why they worshipped Chiodos as kids with heavy, exciting songs like “Sunny Days & Hand Grenades” and “Ole Fishlips Is Dead Now.” But there’s a lot here that proves that old habits die hard.
The band has always toyed around with more radio-friendly songs, and it rarely pans out. This fatal flaw has never been as crippling as it is on Devil with a handful of songs essentially ruining the listening experience. The worst offender is “3 AM,” a track about futile one-night stands and loneliness that could be mistaken for a Plain White T’s single. It’s painfully dull, and feels radically out of place when it first hits. But throughout the album, Chiodos revisits this sugar-coated take on its style and it never lands very well.
The singular exception is “Looking For A Tornado,” opening with a pretty solid acoustic riff and eventually working into a more aggressive style. It’s radio-friendly, but it still feels like Chiodos. Songs like “3 AM” and “Under Your Halo” don’t have that spark, devoid of the signature bite that makes Chiodos stand out from other “screamo”-bandwagoners.
Ultimately, Devil ends up feeling like the work of a band that’s still trying to figure out how to work together again. While there are certainly moments that recapture the (slightly hokey) lightning in a bottle that ran throughout Bone Palace and All’s Well, Devil lacks the singular focus that makes those albums work. And at a marathon 13 tracks, those few moments just aren’t enough to make the album satisfying.
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