Diiv - Is The Is Are

It's been a wild 4 years for Zachary Cole Smith and Co. After the critically acclaimed success of Oshin, the future looked bright for the Brooklyn based shoegaze band. A heroine arrest for Front man Cole, meant jail time and rehab to battle his addiction. Diiv knew they had to put everything into this record or it could be the end to their careers, and that’s what they have done with this album.

The death of guitar based rock is not present on this record, Diiv bring what we loved from Oshin and transform it into the modern idea of shoegaze. It’s the imperfections that bring this album to life, the jangly guitar riffs, heavy bass lines, and lyrics that are clearly about the struggle of his addiction, Cole's complete control on the production was the best possible move from the band. The band seem to be enjoying themselves and that’s what makes this record so special.

Opening track "Out Of Mind" comes out the gate booming, with the band all coming together perfectly, and jamming the song till the end. "Under the Sun" fills our hearts with a deep bass line and a riff that we just can't seem to get enough of. Cole's brought a new structure to his writing and these sing along choruses and keeping the verses simple. 

The dark side of Cole comes out on tracks "Bent (Roi's Song)" and "Incarnate Devil", lyrically this is where Cole breaks his barriers and lets us pick at his brain," Yeah if it feels wrong, you can go on along But once it feels right then you just lost the fight". These references to his addiction gives us an understanding of what was going on in his head during the process of the song writing.

Hands down the best track from the album and the first single released, "Dopamine", everything just went right on this track, drummer Ben Wolf brings the upbeat tempo and well placed fills, Cole and Andrew's guitars riffs are well constructed, and flow with Devin's Bass line. Very personal and emotional lyrics aren't sung to be dwelled upon instead they make you happy and leave you head banging no matter where you are. "Shots wringing out, I'm soaking, Eardrums shaking, years start weighing me down, Buried deep in a heroine sleep Floating deeper underground Passing out, running in place You're the sun and I was your cloud Burning out, running in place, Got so high I finally felt like myself".

There doesn't seem to be any low points in this record and as soon as you think it can't get any better, a mellow tune "Healthy Moon" takes the record even further, what makes this track so special is the quality of its production, it almost sounds as if it comes straight from the demo with almost little to no touching up, and that’s what makes Diiv so special.

We don’t know what the future holds for the Brooklyn based boys, but in a time where shoegaze and guitar based music seems to be coming to its end, Diiv are hitting new levels of success and beating all odds. Cole might even be the new Kurt Cobain but we just don’t know it yet.

8/10