Courtesy of The Guardian.

The Antlers have been labeled as a “sad band.‰” It comes without surprise as one of their earlier albums, a concept album titled Hospice tells the story of a hospice worker caring for a patient suffering from terminal bone cancer. The overall themes were bleak, of loss, and even managed to fit in Sylvia Plath‰’s demise into a heartbreaking homage of a song. 

The dreariness and joylessness in the record was sufficient to consign one to feel hopelessness, as if the inevitable is coming, as if prolonging the fight would be ultimately worthless. Amidst the anger and internal strife, the songs manage to paint a glorious and fluid songwriting success in which makes Hospice tick.

In Familiars, Silberman has managed to transcend his lyrical prowess into something further than in Hospice. 

My favorite track in the album is “Parade”. There is a rebirth, and it vividly describes how one progresses oneself after breaking free from past mistakes and the senselessness of it all. The rebirth and rediscovery is best encapsulated by the last verse of the song: And I can feel the difference when the day begins/Like all I know is this year will be the year we win/We smoke the paper from the banner from our past parades/And start again, before the memory of the mess we‰’ve made.

This is in stark contrast to Hospice, where self-loathing does nothing to improve the condition of everyone. 

Familiars is not by any measure, a joyful record, a oeuvre which you perform at a bachelor‰’s party, but it holds true to the human condition and how people can hold on to hope, and prolong the fight, whatever they are struggling for. 

In “Palace Silberman belts out passionately: He left the tallest peak of your paradise buried in the bottom of a canyon in hell/But I swear I‰’ll find your light in the middle where there‰’s so little late at night/Down in the pit of the well. This is truly the plateau of “Palace,” and has the undertones of what it is to be human. “Director” also echoes the same sentiments, albeit with more instrumental zest as compared to “Palace”.

The “sad band‰” label may be limiting, but there is more to The Antlers, with their eloquent storytelling, and ability to inject life into “sad‰” music.