“Maybe it’s just me, but shoegazey black metal just isn’t as exciting as it used to be. It’s easy to forget just how groundbreaking Alcest’s debut truly was, and though Deafheaven caught a lot of flack for their apparent Pitchfork pandering, I always found Sunbather to be a captivating, dreamy, and refreshingly honest record in a genre that’s far too often up its own ass with being ‘cvlt’ and ‘trve.’ But as happens, the style got saturated, the pioneers got mediocre, and these days the release of a new ‘blackgaze’ album generates about as much anticipation as getting a colonoscopy.” Pucker up, hipstercups!
