HEALTH: "Stonefist"

With the notable exception of Dan Bejar, most indie artists these days seem inclined to discuss their embrace of superpower pop music. In the case of HEALTH, one can assume that stumping for Rihanna and Katy Perry is sincere, but there’s still something cheeky about it—the humor lying in the vast distance between personality-driven fireworks and their own piercing, electronic noise, where vocals hide like bodies in a mass of twisted metal.

But to a far greater degree than hazy previous single “New Coke”, “Stonefist” demonstrates the incremental osmotic effect of spending six years studying the inner workings of “Roar” and “What’s My Name” while maintaining their roots in L.A.’s noise scene. It’s audibly modeled after Get Color‘s “Die Slow”, though it lacks its predecessor’s hesitation about presenting itself as a crossover—Jake Duzsik’s vocals are pushed high in the mix, all of his words clearly enunciated. Whereas “Die Slow” suggested melody while dissipating it in the manner of shoegaze, you can actually follow the curvature of “Stonefist” and sing along with it. Though HEALTH has been workshopping “Stonefist” live since 2012, it might have come in handy during their 2009 tour with Nine Inch Nails. After all, this is the kind of animalistic grind that a lot of people wish Trent Reznor would deliver these days—while acknowledging their flawed existence, “Stonefist” gets HEALTH closer to pop.

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