From the moment Sunbather blasted Deafheaven into…whatever counts as the mainstream for this kind of music, they’ve been polarizing. Not only do metal fans either love them or revile them, the music itself often operates within very disparate styles. They’ve never had much middle ground, after all: they’re either arresting in their beautiful washes of shoegaze guitars and blissed out tremolo textures, or they’re demolishing everything in their path through siren-esque shrieks and pummeling blast beats. They borrow as much from My Bloody Valentine as they do Mayhem, but they’ve also never shied away from evolution either. New Bermuda breathed closer to metalcore and hardcore than shoegaze, and Ordinary Corrupt Human Love was a varied – if sometimes a bit confused collection – of textures, spoken word, metal, alt rock, and morbid atmosphere. But no matter what they were doing, Deafheaven never quite settled into one lane, as they seemed content to operate in the extreme ends of whatever they were exploring. And for as exciting as that tendency towards the extremes made their music, their last album showed signs that maybe they were ready for a big change, but where that change would bring them was anyone’s guess.
Well, where they’ve gone next is that fabled middle ground. Infinite Granite builds upon the promise of Sunbather’s love of shoegaze and texture and retools the band’s entire sound towards that end. That by itself feels like an evolution that was an inevitability for them, but that’s not what makes this album such a surprise. Instead of George Clarke’s paint-peeling missives, he’s instead shifted gears to almost entirely clean vocals. And to be perfectly honest, I’ve long since wanted a bit more variety in his vocal style. But considering just how harsh his vocals are – and how strained they were starting to sound – I wasn’t sure he’d be able to pull off clean singing. I’ve been happily proven wrong, however, because George’s vocals here have a shockingly delicate, soft spoken quality to them. And while he doesn’t have a huge range, he does has great control of what he does have, using it to lend these songs a hypnotic and rhythmic edge. His vocal lines sound as if he was able to transfer the patterns he’d normally use for his screamed vocals into sung ones instead, giving his cadences a unique stutter/stop edge that contrasts perfectly against the hazier, dream-like music that envelops him like a warm blanket.
Much like the huge step George has taken with his vocals, the rest of the band has taken big steps instrumentally as well. While they’ve always had those shoegaze influences as a core part of their sound, it still felt more like they were flirting with the style rather than fully committing to it. On Infinite Granite, though, they’ve found a way to stretch those influences far enough to carry entire songs, and create a bed of lush, vibrant music on every track. So much of this album pushes and pulls with a constant subtle tension, tension that is far removed from the more obvious and foot stomping attack in their metal-centric work. Yet, there’s still plenty to be recognized as distinctly Deafheaven in the way they utilize cathartic build ups and climaxes, black metal-inspired tremolo guitars, and that thick wall of sound that made their previous records so transfixing. It’s impressive how they’ve managed to retain so much of the intensity from their heavier work on such intimate, shy, and emotional compositions. And while it would be easy for a metal band to underpin these delicate tracks with their former aggression and fire, or push them unnecessarily towards big finishes just to take a half-measure towards pleasing fans of the older stuff, Deafheaven excellently walks the line of reserving those powerful finishes for the moments when they count most, making the blistering finishes of Villain and Mombasa so hard hitting when they finally do break out the screams.
However, for as much as I love the new turn Deafheaven has taken here, there’s still a few wrinkles to be ironed out if they’re to continue down this road. George’s vocals are great for what they are, but he still has a little bit of a way to go towards making sure his vocal lines are distinct from track to track and grab the ear. There’s a few stand out moments on these songs that hint at his ability to pull this off in the future, and I’ve found several of the hooks here stuck in my head for days. But his vocals can also start to turn into a bit of a blur towards the end of the album, making it difficult to latch onto specific lyrics and hooks since he essentially has one gear and one gear only. Sometimes this works in the album’s favor, and I do love the hazy hypnotism of those staccato, soft vocals, but other times it wears thin and ironically, could still use a bit more variety in tone and dynamics. The music itself suffers from a similar problem, as well. These songs are engineered to sound thick, lush, and foggy, creating dense layers of sound that are so easy to get lost in. But like George’s vocals, towards the end of the album the trick starts to wear out its welcome, sacrificing atmosphere for memorable guitar parts or tantalizing lead work. I’m hard pressed to pick out any guitar parts here that really wow me, and sometimes that’s a sign that a band knows when to focus on the songwriting instead of showing off their chops, but I can’t help but wish that the guitar work had more meat on its bones than shoegaze-y textures and simple chord progressions.
Despite all that, overall I’m intrigued and in love with Deafheaven’s new sound. They’ve taken a bold risk by jettisoning most of their trademark sound and vocal style, and it seems like Infinite Granite is a record they’ve wanted to make since Sunbather. There’s a lot of promise in how the band utilizes sound and texture to emphasize atmospheres, emotion, and George’s clean vocals, and many parts of this album truly feel like a triumph. But at the same time, there are moments where the band has simply ventured too far into that middle ground that they have avoided for so long. Infinite Granite occasionally yearns for some higher highs, more rise-and-fall dynamics, or even just the odd stand out guitar part to liven up some of what can become one-note and monotonous towards the end of its runtime. But because so much of this record is simply so good at what it is going for right off the bat, this all feels more like transitory growing pains than failure to rise to the occasion. Either way, Deafheaven have opened up a world of doors for themselves with this album, and if it was already hard to guess what direction they would go next, with Infinite Granite they’ve made the possibilities limitless.
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