Storm Static Sleep: A Pathway Through Post Rock

by Jack Chuter

Perhaps the rough edges of The Rescue inspired the band to rock a little bit harder on 2007’s All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone. Drummer Chris Hrasky felt more prominent here, leading the band in vigorous snare drum gallops and pushing the energy levels toward cyclonic shoegaze during the crescendos. Yet the album also travelled in the opposite direction too, perhaps led by the band’s flirtations with soundtrack work. Strings and pianos flecked the softer sections, dangling gently around the edge of listener consciousness like wind chimes. Again, the titles contained little references to film and literature: “The Birth and Death of the Day” was taken from John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, while the album name was taken from dialogue in John Cassavetes’ 1974 film A Woman Under the Influence. The record’s opening moment was truly “all of a sudden”: a detonation of cymbal and tremolo guitars juddering through the listener without warning. With Explosions and Mono, emotions overwhelmed the body’s ability to control them. This music was about the surges of inner happening that humans were powerless to control: the irrepressible swell of love, the inevitable melancholic breakdown that followed a prolonged period of internalised doubt. Again, there was humbleness. Humans are small and frail, forever naïve and in awe of a world that tosses them upon choppy waves of emotion and chance. But how does post-rock combat the onset of familiarity and acquaintance? Once a listener grows accusto...