AFI – Silver Bleeds The Black Sun NEW LP

Description

NEW LP

Run For Cover Records

For more than three decades, AFI has been in a nearly constant state of reinvention. The band have made it a point to evolve with every albumsometimes dramatically sonever allowing themselves to become too comfortable in one genre or rest on any of their impressive career laurels. Its an approach that has grown their audience but also challenged it with a sonic identity that can shift in wild, unexpected directions. Now with their twelfth album, Silver Bleeds the Black Sun, AFI are once again at the start of a bold new chapter, only this time theyve even managed to surprise themselves.

I realize this is something weve said about our records for years, but this record is starkly different from what weve done in the past, says frontman Davey Havok. In our 33 years together, weve covered so much, musically, that I found myself daunted at the prospect of doing something different, and questioning what that would be. So how does a band thats known for creative upheaval still find ways to push themselves out of their comfort zones? Typically the group would start an album by immediately throwing themselves into writing and simply letting their intuitive musical shorthand guide the process, but for Silver Bleeds the Black Sun AFI set out to purposely change their creative approach all together. This time it started with a conversation: how could they break new ground?

The key to moving forward actually ended up coming from AFIs collective past. We started with something that sounded like Echo & the Bunnymen, explains guitarist Jade Puget, who produced and engineered the album. But eventually we ended up with this melange of death rock and post-punkall this stuff from the late 70s and early 80s that we grew up on, like Sisters of Mercy, and Bauhaus, and Siouxsie and the Banshees. The goal became making an album with a singular mood, something dreamy and ethereal, and the band members found themselves diving headfirst into influences that had always been deeply embedded in AFIs musical core, but now were being brought to the forefront. We were leaning into that post-punk world and embracing that part of our DNA, but at the same time still sounding like AFI, says drummer Adam Carson. The result is an album that feels out of time, at once familiar and fresh, drawing on classic sounds and reinterpreting them through a modern lens. Silver Bleeds the Black Sun is dark and otherworldly, but also grandiose and stately, biting and beautiful in equal measurein other words, its very AFI, yet not quite like any version of the band youve ever heard before.

Its this combination of endless creative daring, deftly wielded influences, and above all else, an unshakeable sense of self thats allowed AFI to stay relevant for more than 30 years, often leading the way through emerging musical moments. From their scrappy roots as a high school hardcore band in the early 90s (Answer That and Stay Fashionable, Very Proud of Ya and Shut Your Mouth and Open Your Eyes), to their dark punk reinvention at the turn of the century (Black Sails in the Sunset and The Art of Drowning), to their crossover into mainstream stardom in the early 2000s (Sing the Sorrow and Decemberunderground) and their years as shapeshifting alternative rock journeymen (Crash Love, Burials, The Blood Album, Bodies), the band has survived and thrived by staunchly being themselvesno matter what that is. Weve gotten to experience virtually every aspect of the music industry, Puget says. Whether its playing to 20 people at [legendary DIY punk venue] 924 Gilman Street, and underground clubs across the country, to having a number one song at radio. No one could have predicted that the same snarling hardcore band from Californias East Bay would one day be a globetrotting rock phenomena, racking up platinum records, performing on SNL, or taking home MTV Video Music Awards, but theres a fiercely independent spirit thats remained consistent throughout AFIs journey, and its that same spirit thats led them to their new label, Run For Cover Records, and Silver Bleeds the Black Sun.

Opening track The Bird of Prey immediately introduces many of the albums recurring musical motifs: prominent acoustic guitar strums, lush synth textures, propulsive bass lines, and cavernous drums. These elements combine into something that feels intriguingly new for AFI yet fits perfectly within the bands sweeping milieu. Havoks voice enters the track as if to guide the listener through unfamiliar territory, but throughout Silver Bleeds the Black Sun even his inimitable timbre sounds different. On brooding tracks like Blasphemy & Excess or A World Unmade the singular frontman twists and contorts his voice, pushing himself down to a baritone croon then nimbly swinging back to his soaring tenor range or into a hushed whisper. Elsewhere on the driving post-punk of Voidward, I Bend Back and Marguerite bassist Hunter Burgan channels Peter Hook and Simon Gallup, his airtight playing providing the foundation for Pugets shimmering, intricate guitarwork.

Thematically, Havok describes Silver Bleeds the Black Sun as a struggle to reconcile existence in a godless dystopia that lacks sanctuary, mystique, reason, and a chance of survival. On Holy Visions, he showcases these lyrical themes over the kind of muscular, dark new wave that would make Andrew Eldritch proud. Its a bit tongue-in-cheek, Havok explains. It addresses the concept of right and wrong, and good versus evil, and what is truly evil and is truly good, and whether or not there is such a thing, while also mocking organized religion. Early album standout Behind the Clock roars to life around distorted bass and effects-drenched Killing Joke-esque guitars, while Havok takes inspiration from his lifelong love of the films of David Lynch, dissecting how we relate to the art we consume. Its an exploration of life mirroring art versus art mirroring life, he says. In a grander sense, its about who is part of the art and who is made of the art.

That extra layer of intentionality is part of what makes AFI such a special and enduring band. Where so many long-running groups have stumbled, hung up on audience expectations or nostalgic navelgazing, AFI have flourished by fearlessly driving forward, making something thats authentically meaningful to them and trusting that their genuine enthusiasm for the music will translate to their loyal listeners. Long ago, it became very natural for us to shy away from things that were familiar, Havok says. For me, success is creating something that I feel happy about, and in order for me to connect with something, it has to be fresh. That mentality is palpable throughout Silver Bleeds the Black Sun, even as it comes to a close with Nooneunderground a track that starts with an atmospheric, disquieting introduction before it bursts into a raucous amalgam of death rock anguish and primal punk ferocity. The song feels like an alien, mutated version of AFIs many different eras all seamlessly combined into the kind of outsider anthem that theyve been excelling at for over 30 yearsthe perfect ending to a record that proves AFI still have plenty of surprises left for us.