It’s official: Crime in Stereo have ditched their Lifetime and Kill Your Idols vinyl. Their previous effort, Is Dead, was Brand New worship; Trying has them emerging from their post-everything identity crisis. While vocalist Kristian Hallbert still strains like a Revolution Summer-era Ian MacKaye, this feels more like a rite of passage than a Rite of Spring. It’s a shockingly coherent collection of gorgeous shimmer (“Odalisque”), wall-of-noise dementia (“Exit Halo”) and tinny, AM-radio singalongs (“Drugwolf”). The most cerebral and actualized of their four LPs, the Long Island quintet has discovered the toolbox for their tools, the art to their craft. This, friends, is what happens when hardcore kids leave their church basements.
This article appears in Apr 8-14, 2010.