Bright sparks of the Squid sound were heard on O Monolith and this solid form continues, it would seem, into third album, Cowards. It does not sound like much but the time between O Monolith and the release of Crispy Skin, the release of their third album, feels dramatic. Squid has gone from strength to strength and their only release this year, Bin Song, felt remarkable even if it was destined for the garbage pile after it was cut from their sophomore work. Where they elevate their sound to the next step, Crispy Skin is not some re-evaluation of their fundamentals. Squid was already working in broad instrumental experimentation, the huge strokes paired with specific messages. It makes their sound a treat. This six-minute powerhouse is an intense, bass-driven expansion of what made Fugue (Bin Song) so impressive.
Crispy Skin does not need to reinvent anything, it is steadying the course for Squid who find themselves with a bold new track on their hands. Squid has the sting of every genre going, from the industrial rock fundamentals to the wider freestyle of instrumental fluidity heard in the latter half, Crispy Skin is an album-like experience crammed into six minutes. It is a truly stunning piece of work from a band with plenty of extravagant and often wonderful pieces. Brush it all under the art rock genre and move on. Return to Crispy Skin as much as you can because all those little flickers, those sly and cheeky knocks at the world are embedded in a harsher and often brutal message. Author Agustina Bazterrica has planted some seeds in the head of the five-piece and those slower moments, all the words Ollie Judge has devoured, fear for the everyday tasks come through.
Pair it with all the usual instrumental style expected of the band and fine-tuned to no end, and Crispy Skin becomes a monumental highlight for the band. Their instrumental collaboration, layer after layer and the subtle changes of tempo and tone, are masterful. Ultimately, the slick instrumental riffs and differences paired with this intertextuality of cannibalism as a cultural grift, the self-eating soul trying to fit in as they shift from image to image, is masterfully presented. As Judge and the band leap from set to set, through the hoops of a potential vision, comes a grand and powerful understanding of how we deal with fear. Those little self-help books to get us back on track, the tricky decisions made for us in the pages of some ghoulish book applying advice to all in unremarkable conditions.
Incredible vocal inflexions and an instrumental mixture like nothing else Squid has accomplished, the booming sounds of Crispy Skin are infectious. Exceptional work like this is a great listen but chilling to return to. We hear ourselves in the lyrics, those who turn to books and build their personality around what slips from the page and into the subconscious. Those are the decisions we make, the turns of new characters or personality changes influenced by the guidance of strangers. Such is the case for Crispy Skin, a song denouncing the pursuit of it all because the bullet between the eyes comes for us all, literal or not. Our cravings will get the better of us, we are no better than the routines we set. Crispy Skin is a powerhouse track with a booming message within.
the album is their best!