Thirst, Slow Crush’s first album in four years, is a collection of ten tracks that draws heavily on shoegaze’s “wall of guitars and constant noise” aesthetic. There are also elements of rock and doom metal, shoegaze’s slower, heavier cousin. Bassist and frontwoman Isa Holliday’s vocals drift through the band’s crashing sound, giving the songs an element of dreaminess amid all the racket.
The album kicks off with the title track. It’s a blast of loud guitars and bass, relatively active drums, and Holliday’s floating vocals. Those vocals are placed just deep enough in the mix that it’s difficult to discern her lyrics. That makes her voice more of an additional sound in the band rather than the focal point of the music. “Thirst” establishes a style that Slow Crush mostly sticks to for the rest of the record.
Interestingly, the second track, “Covet”, is an exception. It opens with a heavily strummed acoustic guitar, which is quickly subsumed by the rest of the group crashing in. The song, though, is briskly paced and noticeably brighter. There are even moments when most of the guitars drop out, leaving just Holliday singing and drummer Frederick Meeuwis playing. The track also finishes with something completely unexpected: a saxophone solo. “Covet” shows a version of Slow Crush willing to play with their formula, with the acoustic guitar and sax as welcome sonic touches.
There are scattered moments throughout Thirst where similar unexpected touches surface. “Hollow” is practically a dream pop ballad, with ambient synths and twinkling percussion. A guitar finally enters in the final minute, and the drums show up with just 20 seconds left, but the dreamy first 90% of the song is what sticks with the listener.
The penultimate track, “Ogilt”, is similarly subdued, with quiet, clean guitars and drifting background synth washes. It fades into closer “Hlytt”, which begins with similar clean guitars, but brings Holliday’s vocals back. Eventually, the band return to their typical volume, but they let the song sit in the quiet for a while. The mixing here lets Holliday’s singing stay high in the mix, giving the track a stronger sense of melody. That shifts again in the final 45 seconds of the song, when Holliday’s singing is backed by screaming black metal vocals. It’s a striking shift in the sound, and one that might have been worth exploring further.
These four tracks provide interesting wrinkles to Slow Crush’s basic sound. Unfortunately, that leaves six more tracks on Thirst that sound essentially identical to the title track. I’m all for loud guitars and pounding drums, but the overwhelming impression Slow Crush leaves on most of these tracks is that any melody was an afterthought.
Some of this is due to Holliday’s vocals being buried in the mix. The press materials for the record state that Holliday couldn’t finish recording the vocals for some of these songs without breaking down in tears. It would be nice, as listeners, if we could actually hear what she was singing about that made her so emotional. There is also the fact that guitarists Jelle Ronsmans and Nic Placle provide lots of sound and chords, but virtually no melodic leads or even basic riffs.
That leaves Meeuwis to provide most of the musical personality on these songs. To their credit, Slow Crush essentially let him loose to do his thing. So even when the rest of the song is chugging slowly with indecipherable vocals, at least Meeuwis is there with cool fills and interesting but tasteful rhythm patterns to give the track a little more motion. When the drummer is the band’s most charismatic musician, though, it could indicate that arrangements are not their strong suit.
Just under half of Thirst offers enjoyable listening, while the rest ends up as a loud but mushy blast of guitars, drums, and sleepy vocals. There might be enough here to engage serious fans of shoegaze and maybe doom metal. For most, though, the record will fall a bit short.