Album Review: Trickery by Then Comes Silence

 It’s hard to believe that with the unveiling of Trickery on Metropolis Records this week, Sweden’s gothic darkwave maestros Then Comes Silence have now released seven albums, gradually rising to the forefront of the current scene as their reputation and their following increase with each successive LP.

Many of the bands on the original positive punk scene – Joy Division, Bauhaus, The Sisters of Mercy and Fields of the Nephilim to name but four – never made it anywhere near as far as seven albums in terms of studio releases, and those who did – Siouxsie and The Banshees (Tinderbox, 1986), The Cure (Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me, 1987) or Killing Joke (Outside The Gate, 1988), for example – were not only clearly past their creative best by that point, but had enjoyed some of the trappings of success, along with Top 20 hits, Top 10 albums, sell-out tours, magazine front covers and critical recognition, which encouraged them to continue the struggle and reach that landmark.

All of which makes the uniformly high standard of Then Comes Silence’s output -  and Trickery is no exception – all the more remarkable, as founder member Alex Svenson has coped stoically with multiple line-up changes and the continued relative indifference of the wider music industry and community,  whilst devoting over a decade to developing the project to the very highest of standards, both as a live act and (visually and musically) in their recorded output.

Over the past twelve years, Then Comes Silence’s sonic palette has gradually become more refined, whilst the key elements remain: solid but varied guitar work containing elements of dark psych, Svenson’s own lugubrious croon, powerful drumming and a commitment to excellence in all they undertake.

After a pair of monochromatic self-titled releases creating their distinctive sound, Then Comes Silence really came to prominence with 2015’s Nyctophilian, the first to feature current sticksman Jonas Fransson, whilst 2017’s Blood is regarded by many commentators as the peak of their purely gothic output, and was the first toured by guitarist Hugo Zombie on his arrival in the band the following year. 2020’s Machine and 2022’s Hunger saw the band adding a more subtle veneer to their sound across a broad range of styles, with power and dark melody always the watchwords, and with the core of the band remaining the same despite the departure of second guitarist Mattias Ruejas Jonson, Trickery continues in the same vein, a factor emphasised in the album’s cover, the purple background not too many shades from its predecessor.

Sonically, the album commences with a couple of typical TCS belters, the full-on Ride Or Die (with its chorus nod to the melody of [Ghost] Riders in the Sky) and the more commercial Like A Hammer (with very obvious lyrical steals from the band’s own back catalogue, the sign of a project comfortable in its own skin), with the Swedes’ instantly recognisable sound containing many of the elements which made their previous records such critical successes.

Already hinted at in the opening track, Svenson’s recent obsession with the analogue synthesiser sound of the Futurist movement of the early 1980’s (as showcased on his recent solo project Neonpocalypse) is added to the opening section of Feel The Cold, which broadens out into a more traditional guitar-based chorus, whilst the experimental side cranks up on the eerie and discordant opening to the goth’n’roll stomp of Tears and Cries, which likes tracks on previous albums benefits from a female co-vocal, on this occasion provided by Emma Nylen of Emmon.

Zombie’s grungy guitar prelude to the up-tempo Ramones-influenced pop-punk thrash Stay Strange (with current scene figurehead Dusty Gannon of Vision Video adding additional vocals) introduces the album’s third phase, and the one most likely to appeal to fans of the band’s middle period, with the dark psych quotient dialled up significantly on the magnificent Stiffs. Fransson’s energetic drumming, the spooky keyboard drones, and the powerful guitar of Bright Eye, maintain the dark punk feel, with hints of the spectre of a more subtly melodic Killing Joke permeating through the song.

 

The Masquerade sees a further shift change, with the emphasis on a creeping, more dancefloor friendly backbeat, a softer vocal and the return of the starker synth sounds, and is perhaps the album’s darkest moment (“There’s no escape..”) whilst Never Change finds Svensson in a more positive, reflective and unapologetically defiant mood (“We really haven’t changed much, we’re never gonna change…The light burns bright”), with Zombie’s bouncier riffs matching the lyric’s uplifting atmosphere. The Blink 182-style blitzkrieg is back for Dead Friend, which at under two minutes is more reminiscent of the shorter, punkier sketches on the band’s earliest albums and Zombie’s work with his previous band, Los Carniceros del Norte.

However, the more cinematic soundscapes of the band’s more recent releases are back for the album’s more epic pair of closing tracks, the classy dark pop (think The The) of Runners followed by the slow-building finale Ghost House which leaves the album on a more hauntingly melancholic note (“abandoned heart, abandoned soul, abandoned love”).

Trickery stands as a monument to the current gothic darkwave scene, the sound of a proud band continuing to soldier on together with their loyal band of followers through the adversity of fate whilst maintaining a strong belief in the beauty of the dark soul. With this seventh album, Then Come Silence seem to have nobly accepted that (although hope dies last…) they will probably never achieve anything like the sales or play to the size of audiences that their 1980’s predecessors enjoyed, despite the sheer quality of their ever-growing sequence of excellent albums and the ringing endorsements of all who have heard their output, but are honourably content to keep developing their sound for themselves, their fans, and their art.

Bandcamp link