Band:	Spiritbox
Album:	The Fear Of Fear
Style:	Djent, Metalcore, Progressive metal
Release date:	November 2023

01. Cellar Door
02. Jaded
03. Too Close / Too Late
04. Angel Eyes
05. The Void
06. Ultraviolet

Between Dissona’s long-awaited return, Insomnium backing up the quality of Anno 1696 with the similarly impressive Songs Of The Dusk, and As The Sun Falls going toe-to-to with Insomnium, it’s been a good month for metal EPs. Spiritbox quickly established themselves with a couple of quality EPs, so hopes are high for their own entrant into this discussion.

It was arguably subsequent singles such as “Holy Roller” and “Blessed Be” that built Spiritbox’s hype levels to the insane heights they reached prior to 2021’s full-length debut Eternal Blue, but their 2017 self-titled EP and 2019 Singles Collection played their part in putting the Iwrestledabearonce spin-off on the map. Personally, it was my enjoyment of both those releases that played a part in my underwhelmed response to Eternal Blue, which streamlined the writing approach present on Spiritbox in particular. Given the predictably enthusiastic mainstream media response to Eternal Blue, my expectations of any return to those days from Spiritbox were minimal, but I then saw some comments on singles released for The Fear Of Fear describing them as a return to the sound of the early years. Having listened to The Fear Of Fear, I don’t entirely see this, but there are songs of merit here.

For me, this EP is front-loaded in terms of standout songs, and the first two songs show off the two extremes of Spiritbox very effectively. “Cellar Door” is a bruising cut, with a frenetic opening, gnarly djent grooves, and earth-shaking breakdowns; however, particularly later on, there’s intriguing use of the kind of eerie clean tones that Monuments have effectively used in the past. It’s not a pristine example of this kind of style, but it’s a solid opening effort, one that is devoid of clean vocals. “Jaded” provides stark contrast, taking a more melodic approach, from the understated synth intro through to the stirring chorus. Courtney LaPlante’s vocal melodies in the chorus in particular could easily be adapted for a tender pop song, but they work really well with the metallic backing instrumentation; as much as I found the simplicity of aspects of Eternal Blue offputting, it was as much the band’s hooks as it was their djent crunch that allured me to their pre-Eternal Blue material, and “Jaded” is a great example of what they’re capable of when on form.

As for the rest of the EP, I find it to generally be a mixed bag, but overall, while not obviously doing anything in particular that they don’t do on their songs that I jive with, I find myself struggling to fully click with much of it. “Too Close/Too Late”, another song on the more melodic side but with some polyrhythms powering beneath the chorus in contrast to the light instrumentation in the verses, doesn’t have anything obviously different going on compared to “Jaded” (except a less direct sense of pathos), yet the former moves me and the latter bores me. Similarly, the electronics-based closing song “Ultraviolet” again serves as a platform for LaPlante’s impressive talents, but comes across as quite an insipid metal-pop ballad.

The one real exception to this trend in the latter stages of The Fear Of Fear is the EP’s other heavy song, “Angel Eyes”, which feels like a spiritual successor to breakout hit “Holy Roller” while also using those Monuments clean tones that appeared on “Cellar Door”. While I find it to be a bit drier than either of those songs, when it gets going there are some feisty djent grooves, plus a rather monstruous breakdown. While it doesn’t do a whole lot to get me excited, it’s satisfying at a primal level throughout its runtime.

Spiritbox are clearly going to be a fixture of the metal mainstream for years to come, and they do have the talent to justify this; when they get it right, there’s songs in their arsenal that absolutely work to my tastes. Unfortunately, while in some ways more intriguing than its predecessor in Eternal Blue, this new EP The Fear Of Fear is a tad too hit-and-miss for me to embrace in the way I did the band’s initial releases.