As the dog days of August rolled over into a temperate September, we were privy to an announcement that felt nothing short of a resurrection. In late Auust, Crime In Stereo triumphantly declared an end to their 13-year hiatus. Far from merely marking a comeback, their return felt like an awakening—an audacious statement that proves not only their continued relevance but also their growth as musicians and commentators of our complicated times.
If you think Crime In Stereo is merely picking up where they left off, you’re in for a spellbinding surprise. Due to be unveiled on October 27th via Pure Noise Records, their upcoming album, “House & Trance,” is an odyssey that maps the contours of human struggles and societal disquiet. It’s a bold composition that doesn’t just echo but amplifies the ethos of a band known for their critical acumen and sonic creativity.
Today, the band unveiled their latest single, “Rogue Wave,” which is perhaps the most compelling of the trio released to date. The track echoes the irresistible allure and warm, melodious yet dynamically robust qualities found in their 2007 album, “Crime in Stereo Is Dead.”
This new offering serves as a nostalgic anthem, ideal for accompanying your nocturnal road trips or enhancing the cinematic moments in your life. It’s a masterfully constructed rock song that seamlessly blends atmosphere and artistry. Listen below.
“Everyone enjoyed their time here. Idle afternoons, doused in coolant. Organized activities scheduled around coronal ejections. Juice boxes unlimited to members and two free with every guest day-pass. By now, most of the senators owned lucrative cement businesses, but many complained of the difficulty making new friends in adulthood. Bank holidays were especially tough on the interns, long weekends of splashing acid on the faces of their rivals’ constituents and filing detailed expense reports for the chemicals, which somehow they still would never get fully reimbursed for.”
“As tiring as it is to be a reasonable human in 2023 America, the greater exhaustion is in wondering, ‘What is wrong with everyone else?'” reflects Hallbert, the band’s vocalist, encapsulating the societal frustrations that course through the album.
Their lead single “Hypernormalisation” is a thematic behemoth—demanding not just a listen but a deep meditation on human indifference amidst our own impending doom. While “Books Cannot Be Killed By Fire” takes a scalpel to ongoing Republican attempts to sanitize and reshape history, numbing us to the unsettling truths of America’s legacy.
“These songs don’t just skate on societal issues; they dive into the core questions troubling our generation—from the creeping shadow of authoritarianism to the societal disarray birthed by unfettered capitalism,” comments Dunne, the band’s guitarist who endured a life-threatening septic infection during the album’s making.
Produced by band members Romnes and Cioni, the album steers clear of feeling like a disjointed patchwork of songs. Instead, it’s a fluid narrative, suggesting the 13-year hiatus was but a brief intermission, a pause for reflection before launching into a new creative phase.
At the intersection of broad societal issues and intimate personal struggles lies Dunne’s own ordeal with mortality—a thread that weaves through the fabric of “House & Trance.” The album swings between the poles of existential dread and somber realism, an emotional dialectic that makes ignoring it not just difficult but irresponsible.
“It feels like capturing that post-modern, middle-aged, suburban ennui—owning a home, having a child, and yet feeling the immense weight of the world,” Dunne elaborates.
“Rogue Wave” lyrics
Boil away the excess,
bottle up the rest
Forget the wreckage
Let the weather kill what’s left
You’ll never guess
which segments fracture under stress
You’ll never guess
the way the wave reacts
Now they’ve got elephant tranqs
locked in the oxygen tanks
As a toxic bloom
crashed upon the banks,
I swim to you
Caught in a low wake,
grown into a wave
Underneath the weight
above you
Devour
Spin out
Are you waiting
in the way?
Got in a rogue wave
to drown
you out
Barricade the exits
Miles of velvet rope
to hold you closer
until the weather kills us both
And they’ve got elephant tranqs
locked in the oxygen tanks
As a toxic bloom
crashed upon the banks,
I swim to you
I’m spinning, still drifting out
Low wake, rogue wave
A way to take
the beast by the hand,
lead him from the arena
and out into the land
