The band you once knew is gone, and it's not coming back. ‘Burials’, AFI’s ninth studio record, has been trumpeted in some corners as a return to the territory occupied on ‘Sing The Sorrow’, but any similarities here are heavily filtered through the quartet’s recent moves.
Less a continuation of the pitch black, breakneck punk displayed on ‘Black Sails In The Sunset’ and ‘The Art Of Drowning’, ‘Sing The Sorrow’ instead introduced a further dash of Davey Havok’s theatricality, opened the floor up to Jade Puget’s intricate guitar work and dropped a synth bomb that reshaped the band’s whole outlook.
‘Burials’ is something of a culmination of those themes. It makes ‘Crash Love’ look even more like an unscheduled diversion than it already did, boasting sweeping production and a brooding, damaged worldview courtesy of lyrics that deliver on Havok’s early promise of ‘panic and anxiety and betrayal and cruelty’.
The bright injections of synth that littered ‘Decemberunderground’ are gone, replaced by opulent, doom-laden roars, while Gil Norton’s presence behind the desk has ensured that when Puget cuts loose, the guitars can be suffocating in their intensity.
Beneath the bluster are some of the better songs in AFI’s recent catalogue. While the record’s lead single, I Hope You Suffer, hinted at plenty of pomp and circumstance, ‘Burials’ is at its best when dialled down a notch or two.
A Deep Slow Panic and 17 Crimes could comfortably have been spawned in the intervening period between ‘Sing The Sorrow’ and ‘Decemberunderground’, while Wild, Greater Than 84 and Anxious all hit hard as the record speeds to its conclusion.
The atmospherics are more effective on The Conductor, one of many Puget highlights, but Heart Stops, Rewind and The Embrace form something of a flabby middle. ‘Burials’ is far from perfect, then, but when its swirling ideas fall into place it has plenty going for it. Whether that's enough to entice some lost souls back into the picture remains to be seen.
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