Thrice

The Illusion of Safety (2002)

goodriddance21

This album is unarguably one of the finest of the year. It has all the elements of raging hardcore(a mixture of screaming and driving guitars) and about as much melody as is possible to get in a song. Every song on this album is great, no doubt. The music is catchy as hell and the lyrics give Greg Graffin of Bad Religion or Russ Rankin from Good Riddance a run for their money.( As if they care about it anyway) Now to the songs. The album starts off with "kill me quickly." Rising guitars and bursts into a hardcore riff then directly into a heavy dose of melody. This exchange permeates the entire song. More punk rock bands should write songs with this much energy and emotion. One of the best opening tracks on an album ever. It starts off the album like "Wouldn't it be Nice?" off the Pennywise self-titled record. The second song, "a subtle dagger" follows the opening track in step in terms of the opening hardcore riff and then the melody. These songs are very similar, bouncing off each other and creating an enticing introduction to the album. "See you in the shallows" is a song about an aspect of life coming to an end, whatever it may be. This may be the softer side of Thrice. "Bertrayal is a symptom" reminds of The Refused with the pounding drums and guitars feeding off each other. Then, our of nowhere, here comes the burst of melody, then the hardcore back and forth. They pull off it were cutting precision. This characteristic sets Thrice apart from a lot of bands that seem to have one continous sound, but Thrice obviously does not which makes them so good. I have chosen not to talk about the rest of the songs for the mere fact that the album grows and builds and gets better with every song. This album has all the elements of being a great punk rock record - the vocals, the lyrics, and the music. Their creative mix of punk rock, hardcore, pop melodies, and amazing musicianship makes the best record of the year. And check out the piano if you get a chance.