Parts and Labor – Receivers

Receivers continues Parts and Labor’s history of compelling releases. It’s lighter on the noise and fury than past releases, but it hasn’t lost the skills to best most of its competitors in the space. It’s a “more mature” album that won’t satisfy all longtime fans. Sometimes, though, you have to let go of the past to hear and appreciate what’s new.

The band seems to have traded in its balls-out pummeling rock for more complex compositions that progress a bit from Mapmaker. Some of the more drawn out tunes like “Wedding in a Wasteland” pair power-chord bridges with anthemic verses and choruses. It’s gotten to the point where you can almost sing along – something nearly unthinkable in the band’s earliest days. The catharsis of the playing has been sublimated but not dispatched altogether, even if “Mount Misery” comes close to being “pretty” instead of the usual “brutal.”

“Little Ones” – a Celtic(?!) flavored song – begins menacingly enough with a keyboard drone and other ominous noises. But once it really gets going, it sounds an awful lot like Oneida. Neither band is afraid to throw in some experimentation with its distorted keyboards and psychedelic overtones. It’s the element that takes “Nowheres Nigh” from being a standard late-90s alt-rock tune and turning it into an intriguing excursion into accessibility. “Solemn Show World” follows a similar trajectory, with the deep bass notes anchoring the verses. The instrumental bridges open things up into passages worthy of the Young Gods.

Now that the band has slowed things down, you have space to pick up on some of the things that might have sped by too quickly on releases past. Yes, those vocals really do sound like there’s some Gary Numan in their cold delivery. Yes, the band does have a flair for the subtly epic. Yes, there are real melodies girding these songs.

Maybe some of the mellowing can be accounted for by the replacement of drummer Christopher Weingarten, whose absolutely maniacal pounding did much to define the band’s sound and especially live energy. Parts and Labor have expanded their sonic palette with Receivers and with it may find some new fans who wouldn’t have been able to tolerate the overwhelming stimulation of previous releases.