Chvrches sophomore album "Every Open Eye"

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I can’t imagine the sort of pressure that comes after you release a great, fully-formed, instantly popular debut album. “Sophomore slump” is an overused term for a reason. There are so many ways the second album can go badly. An artist can get too ambitious. An artist can fail to get ambitious enough. Sometimes, an artist tries out a whole new sound and completely misses out on everything that was great about the first album in the first place. Sometimes, an artist returns to the exact same sound and makes an album that turns out to be a shadow of the first one. I was a bit worried upon learning that Chvrches had returned to the same studio where they made 2013’s The Bones Of What You Believe, figuring that they wanted to remain the same band, no matter what. That’s an admirable idea, but it doesn’t always work out. This time, it worked out. Chvrches are very much the same band who made Bones, and Every Open Eye finds every big, sincere, melodic sweet spot that that album hit. But this time around, they’re more locked-in, more efficient, and more assured. They attack their chosen sound with force and vigor and joy, and they’ve given us a version of what Bones would be if Bones was an even better album.

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Chvrches have spent the past two years touring hard and playing to big audiences, learning what works and what doesn’t. And if you’ve seen them live anytime recently, you know what a steady and confident show they have. They don’t rely on lights or props or effects, and they don’t even do that much onstage, except for the once-a-show moment when Martin Doherty grabs the mic and tears around the stage like a teenage hardcore-band frontman. They just stare straight at you and push these songs in your face. The Bones songs could work in that situation.

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