Emo veterans Tigers Jaw are back, and their philosophical lyricism will have you longing for places you haven’t even been.
Tigers Jaw make albums like English professors. Now on their seventh record, Lost On You is a carefully constructed musical lasagne, layered with hope and hurt and yearning and learning. The Scranton five show and don’t tell, making listeners dig through its depths to find the meanings for ourselves.
Ultimately, Lost On You’s most glaring theme is time. It’s about the different versions of yourself, and how they all exist at once. The band taps into the complexities of existence, how you can be an adult and still not feel grown up. They do so from a place that feels both forlorn and at times optimistic, finding joy in not knowing what’s next, summarised by co-vocalists Ben Walsh and Brianna Collins on Primary Colors: ‘It’s not supposed to make sense.’
Head Is Like A Sinking Stone mirrors this in its sound alone, a guitar riff inciting some sort of longing for a feeling that’s hard to even put a name on. It’s one of the record’s rockier and moody offerings, but ballad Baptized On A Redwood Drive takes the crown in this regard, coming in at over five minutes and spanning big swooping choruses and lullaby-esque keys right at the end. Moving on and acceptance is confronted on Light Leaks Through, where Ben sings, ‘Hurts to be alive and not beside you / But the version of the person that you miss does not exist.’
This is an album that might make you bawl your eyes out, but it may also make you feel like things are gonna work out okay. The results will probably vary on every listen, and depending where your own head’s at. It even cleverly loops right back to the short intro track with its final and titular diamond Lost On You, sharing the same lyrical themes of sensitivity and searching for peace among it all. Tigers Jaw are masters of a craft that they feel like the founders of.
Verdict: 4/5
For fans of: Joyce Manor, Turnover, Basement
Lost On You is released on March 27 via Hopeless.
