Hooveriii

I’ve had a chance to sit with this one for a while and each listen leaves a few more scorch marks on the speakers. Hooveriii have spent the past few years perfecting a balance of heat and hallucination — a psych-pop psi-op with an agenda to turn adrenaline into ecstasy. The band’s last few albums have built up their studio prowess, culminating in the widescreen wonders of 2023’s Pointe. The album turned their stage-gnarled sound into something bigger, a more ornate vision that found prog taking center stage. For the follow-up, the band leans back into instincts. Recorded fast n’ fuzzy with Eric Bauer at Discount Mirrors, the record still has a coat of wax on its hooks, but the pace feels less precise. The band self-imposed a month to get the bones of the record together and then flung themselves into Bauer’s autoclave environment, heightening every hue and turning the record into the biggest version of their sound yet.

The crucible cooks the cuts well, and Manhunter sweats sonic heat from every pore. The band loosens the handling, still sparkling with a glossy finish, but driving their songs with a new abandon. Hoover and co aren’t afraid to scuff ‘em up from time to time here. “The Fly” feels like it might skid into the wall at any time. “Heaven At The Gates” is chewing its own chains, ready to burst by the end of its runtime. For every measured pop splash like “Westside Pavilion of Dream,” there’s an equally popped-pupil counterpoint; the entropy of “Isolation,” or the queasy fury of “Tarantula Eye.” The band has proven that they can plan and plot and turn their turbulence into a nine and a half-minute epic, but here they assert that under the gun they can wrestle chaos into catharsis and sound good doing it.

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