Originally written by Chris Redar
Ever since 1997’s Temple of the Morning Star, Today is the Day has replaced either most or all of the rhythm section with each subsequent release. This has, in essence, forced mastermind Steve Austin to build the band’s sound from the ground up on six separate occasions. The results have been nothing if not incredibly polarizing. This has never really been a band that one thinks is ‘just ok’—Today is the Day tends to be a love or hate kind of project. And based on personal conversations, people that hate TITD really fucking HATE them. We’re talking ‘cringe at the very thought of having to hear a single tune’ hate. 2011’s Pain is a Warning could have been the record to change that, were it properly promoted. A radical departure from the frenetic circus sideshow of the band’s previous effort Axis of Eden, Pain is a Warning was essentially a straight-up rock album with very few twists or turns in its road to single-pedal glory.
Animal Mother, the latest from Today is the Day, is the exact opposite of its predecessor in every imaginable aspect. Gone is the warm and deep production from unknown burnout Kurt Ballou—Austin is back behind the boards, and this shit walks a razor-thin tightrope between genius-level hollow and unlistenable nightmare. And it’s a much better album as a result. Animal Mother sounds like the marriage of Sadness Will Prevail’s nihilistic detachment and In the Eyes of God’s ferocious grind/death hybrid attack. And, as such, the first listen is rough, to say the least. The title track opens up with the thing closest resembling a typical ‘song’ on the album, with a chorus and such.
After that, things take a turn for the strange, with Austin and new guys Jeffrey Lohrber and Sean Conkling using stark repetition to drive points home whether the listener is wanting them to or not. That is another staple of TITD’s now double-digit catalog—this is very indulgent music written by and for the members of the band at that moment. The audience is always an afterthought, which has always been a part of the barrier between the casual crowd and these guys. Take a song like “Outlaw”, for example. Presented here in both acoustic and ‘regular’ form (certainly not the first time Austin has done this), it’s essentially one riff, one beat, and one vocal line. But taking space on a commercially released LP to see what two takes on the same material might sound like? That’s about as indulgent as it gets.
This is also the most depressing album since Sadness Will Prevail by a longshot. It may even out-sad Sadness depending on the mood of the listener. Closer “Bloodwood” spends seven miserable minutes tapping away on a xylophone underneath the most unsavory acoustic riff in recent memory. Austin’s breathy delivery of what sounds like parting words only reaffirm what the entire album was getting at: you, as the listener, are not to enjoy this on your own terms. You are merely an audience to the tragedy of this as it unfolds and concludes on its own terms.
Which means, of course, that existing fans of the band are going to go apeshit for this one. It’s some of Austin’s more masterful work in a career already lined up with minor classics. Non-fans, on the flipside, already know they’re going to loathe this, so don’t bother. It’s a generally weird album that leaves very little room for interpretation. Yours truly falls into the former category, so this will most likely remain in heavy rotation, as most of TITD’s catalog does anyway.
