Review: Explosions In The Sky - Take Care, Take Care, Take Care

Artist: Explosions In The Sky
Title: Take Care, Take Care, Take Care
Format: Full-length
Year: 2011
Label: Temporary Residence
Genre: Post-rock
Rating: 90 / 100

Yep, it took about 4 years, but it's finally here; the new album from post-rock legends Explosions In The Sky. Their previous albums gained quite a lot of attention, pretty much setting the standard for the oh so famous typical modern post-rock sound; the fast tremolo picking, the melancholic mazes of melodies and the dynamic song structures often working towards dramatic climaxes. Many people might have been a bit afraid of Explosions In The Sky drifting away from their original sound, especially after a 4 year absence, and the release of a surprisingly accesible new Mogwai album. Those people were partially right, this Take Care, Take Care, Take Care doesn't contain the same sound as for example The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place, but when talking about musical quality this album is still  far from inferior.

Last couple of weeks I've seen some bands that went through  (sometimes subtle) sound changes, resulting in what could often be called a deception. There was the new, kind of modest, Times New Viking album, a new Smith Westerns album, which also didn't really got my feet off the floor and of course the biggest disappointment yet: Party Store by The Dirtbombs. Explosions in the Sky have definitely moved towards something slightly different from the sounds of their earlier work, they incorporated some sampling into their music, there are these occasional electronic elements and something I also noticed is the more droning type of sound during the clean parts, instead of the clear tremolo picking which was a major part of their earlier works.

Now, these new elements could of course result in music not in any way as good as what it used to be, but what we're dealing with here is a band called Explosions In The Sky, in my humble opinion one of the best post-rock bands to ever walk on the face of the earth, and yes they again made something absolutely lovely, something which might disappoint some fans because of their subtle sound change, but also something I begin enjoying more and more everytime I hear it. I've fell in love with tracks like Six Days At the Bottom of the Ocean and especially Catastrophe and the Cure, but those are tracks that won't deliver anything new after the third or fourth listen, a track like Let Me Back In on the other hand makes me able to discover new things every time I hear it, again and again. That's probably what made them need 4 years to write and record this album, there are so many layers, so many melodies to be found in every song, even 'though post-rock is already known for being exceptionally dynamic music, Explosions in the Sky seem to take it to another level.

Ok, those were all the things I loved about Take Care, Take Care, Take Care, aren't there any flaws then? Well yes there are, but it's the same kind of criticism they always get, their type song structure is still fairly predictable, still, I would call Take Care, Take Care, Take Care the least predictable album from their whole discography, mainly due to those electronic elements and the smaller focus on climaxes. Another quite minor flaw for me were the "ooh ooh"-vocal samples at the start of Trembling Hands, it was an experimentation probably, and I hope they will keep it an experimentation, because it adds absolutely nothing to their music, it just gets a bit obnoxious after a while.

Fortunately those minor flaws detract alomost nothing from the unprecedented awes0meness of this record, those 6 songs together really form a beautiful, slightly nostalgic unity, a fine breath of life, a sunny sunday afternoon, with a dramatic, yet loving end, it's like a 46 minute, polaroid tinted, description of the first leaves of spring evolving from the tree's branches. 

Spread the birds' tjilping, it's what I love,

Selwin.