Your Deep Rest

The album kicks off with a song accurately titled “An Introduction to the Album”, a slow burning anthem with a slow, calming guitar lead serving as a background for Christian Holden to sing an infectious repeated vocal melody throughout the first half of the song. Christian’s voice is by no means perfect, but his untrained vocals allow genuine emotion to shine through as we hear the stress his voice is put under for some of the more demanding notes. The song twists and turns with the same guitar lead, and sustained piano, until finally Christian lets out a pained cry of “the pills that you gave didn't do anything, I just slept for years on end”, just before the full band crashes with the agony and intensity of an insufferable defeat. For

Grief and loss are at the center of most of the songs subject matter, fondly remembering friends and loved ones as well as questioning and second guessing each of those past relationships. The lyrics to “Your Deep Rest” detail conversations had with a close friend leading up to his or her suicide. Sadness encompasses the narrator’s voice as “I found the notes you left behind, little hints and helpless cries. Desperate wishing to be over” is sung over the quiet guitars, and guilt is confronted as “I called in sick from your funeral. The sight of your family made me feel responsible” is sung as the chorus. It embodies the horrors of realizing you could have helped, that you could have in some way changed how things turned out. Instead, that friend has died, and suddenly you’re left realizing that you slowly watched it happen. The song ends with admitting that “I watched you set your spirit free”. It’s these narratives that leave an impression on the listener. As strong as the music is, these stories are what stick with you whether you want them to or not. They are deeply personal and at the same time dangerously relatable. “Life in Drag” details the inner turmoil of a transgender individual in a heart wrenching way, discussing the pain of feeling alienated even in your own body. Home, Like NoPlace Is There’s narrative is written around a character who is surrounded by loved ones who “resolved to make (their) chaos external”, and who’s “wrist showed the bone”. The final track “Dendron” puts a fitting end to the narrative that the album created as a whole, ending with some of the most haunting lyrics on the