DEAFHEAVEN
*Ordinary Corrupt Human Love*
(Anti-Records)
Deafheaven’s fourth album *Ordinary Corrupt Human Love* is the band’s least brutal, the album that more evenly balances the beautiful guitar harmonies with the incoherent Banshee wails of singer George Clarke. Grindcore passages still exist during the seven-song, one hour playtime, but grooves instead of brutality seems to take precedence, most evident on “Honeycomb.” Opener “You Without End” sets this tone as a song with a piano riff backbone amid guest vocalist Nadia Kury reading passages from a short story by Oakland author Tom McElravey--passages that celebrate the ordinary yet sublime moments of life, such as a flock of geese flying by. The early guitar interplay on “Canary Yellow” is an audio example of this seemingly ordinary beauty, with hardcore metal movements developing later during the song’s 12-minute playtime. “Near” is a dreamy, shoe-gazer ballad featuring clean vocal harmonies, and “Night People” again relies on piano and female vocals for maximum atmospheric effects.
The original print version of this review appeared in the October 2018 issue of Illinois Entertainer magazine: Click link and navigate the PDF file to page 55.
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