Wackiness.org Reviews Archive § Music

Explosions in the Sky have, with their latest effort, The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place, released roughly the same album they released two years ago with Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Die/Live Forever. Made up of suspiciously familiar crescendo-driven songs, with the same melancholy but majestic tone, Cold Dead Place could easily have been the unreleased second half of Those Who Tell the Truth - there is nothing as immediately affecting as "The Moon is Down", or as immediately intense as "Greet Death", but the songs are, in general, remarkably unchanged in their style and listenability. "The Only Moment We Were Alone" and "Memorial" are the highlights of the album, reaching in their last minutes the intensity of the previous album that is elsewhere disappointingly absent. Which isn't to say that the rest of it's boring, because it's not - the whole album comes off as a pleasant-throughout 45-minute song, with a few selections-movements-whatnot that jump out as brilliant. It's disappointing to find little musical change on Explosions' part, but it's a surprise that they've released a follow-up that's as good, or almost as good, as their excellent debut.

Rating

85/100

Reviewer

Noah Jackson

Published

November 08, 2003