I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness

I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness

A band so bold they sealed a seven-word sentence for their name is equally blasé about between-album lag times. Dust marks the local quintet's sophomore LP, first peep since 2006 debut Fear Is on Our Side. Again produced by Ministry's Paul Barker, its opener "Faust" introduces the 10-song disc with fiery speed, deceptive to the following slowcore. Sonically similar to its predecessor, the bulk of Dust is brooding rock noir, thick with spatial guitar tones and a minimalist manifesto as sleek as its blackened blank-slate cover art. Standout "Come Undone" crawls, its repetitive, menacing yet enticing guitar buildup eventually meets with crashing percussion. The vinyl glides from the palatable New Wave goth-pop of "The Sun Burns Out" to drone ballads "Safely" and "Heat Hand Up," the latter duo leveled by contrastingly soaring Bauhaus guitar tones. Without grand backstory clarifying their lengthy absence, the outfit's nonchalant return isn't necessarily a reunion, the collective citing interim "living lives" and "raising families" trade-off. Presumably, eight-year sabbaticals produce some altering epiphany, but ILYBICD's hiatus instead sustains a mounting mystique while maintaining their dark stylistic stamp, a hint toward the literalism of their assuredly elusive moniker.