There are very, very few bands that make me wait with bated breath for a new album like envy, but then again, there are very few bands like envy.  For the last 32 years, they have continually been a gigantic cut above the rest of their peers, and even when it seemed like the end was in sight, they managed to bounce back and make yet another triumph of an album.  It’s been four long years since that triumph, The Fallen Crimson and eunoia, the band’s 10th full-length release, is then a follow up to their reemergence; but how does it stack up to the rest of their legacy?

The roots of eunoia begin where most music these days begins: with a question of what our place in the world is, a realization of powerlessness in the face of an increasingly fractured society, and the hope that springs eternal from day-to-day life.  It’s tough stuff, but envy are known for their poignant lyrics and profoundly touching music, all anchored by the raspy yell and plaintive spoken word of once-and-future vocalist Tetsuya Fukagawa.  After a brief absence from the band, he and several new members made their triumphant return on stage and on The Fallen Crimson and they haven’t looked back since.  2021’s Seimei was a small taste of what is to come on eunoia, an album the band recorded exclusively to play live.  Having had the tremendous fortune of seeing envy live, I can only say that if they come back to the US, there is no distance I wouldn’t travel and no price I wouldn’t pay to experience that again.  Especially considering eunoia is, without hyperbole, a goddamn fucking masterpiece.

Nobody ever needed envy to “return to form.”  They’ve never quite made the same album twice, and they’ve always nebulously flowed through post-hardcore (let’s just call it “screamo,” because that’s what it is) and post-rock, ambient, metal and even electronic music.  However, eunoia features a lot more of the aggressive screamo that they are known for, interspersed with ballads like lead single “Beyond the Raindrops” and closer “January’s Dusk.”  These softer and more delicate moments are, debatably, the most emotionally impactful moments on the album, but I find myself continually drawn to the more aggressive side of eunoia.  It’s moments like “Imagination and Creation” and “Whiteout” that really show more of what this new lineup can do when they are firing on all cylinders, more even than on The Fallen Crimson, looking back on it.  The former is a blast-beat filled romp through a classic post-hardcore formula with the requisite emotional weight that envy injects into everything, and the latter transitions from a jangly, minor key eunoia really is an amalgamation of the best things that envy can do, but there is no one person on this album that stands out more than Tetsu.  To use the parlance of the times, the man is absolutely cooking.  There is a wild abandon to the soft, restrained spoken-word style of poetry that he employs.  I always find myself getting lost in his voice, especially in the long segments of recitation (heh), but on eunoia he even loses himself in the outpouring of emotion, especially at the climaxes of “The Night and the Void,” “January’s Dusk” and “Whiteout,” where his voice audibly breaks and you actually get to see the transition from quiet and contemplative to roaring and bellowing in real time.  His voice is gripping and I find myself hanging on his every word, even though I can’t understand a word of it.  He actively leads the charge for the rest of the band, and the end result is something that sounds vital, inspired, fucking transcendent.

eunoia might very well be the best envy release.  Is that blasphemy?  Maybe.  It’s definitely true that my favorite (and, by extension, what I would consider “the best”) envy release is the one I listened to the last, and I’m listening to it right now.  But it’s the one that has felt the most alive and striking out of their recent releases.  That’s definitely saying something, because no one would dare call The Fallen Crimson or Atheist’s Cornea “dull” and “uninspired.”  And yet, this album resonates with me in a way that few other albums do.  This is a treasure, and it’s only the beginning, all over again.

— Ian

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eunoia will be available October 11 on Pelagic Records.  For more information on envy, visit their Facebook page.