Spirit in the Room by Activity

While grief often receives an unfair appraisal in pop culture as something roughly equivalent to depression, the real life experience of grief manifests as a meandering and painful yet healthy and natural process. For the members of New York darkwave artist Activity, Spirit in the Room serves a key role in this process as the lyricist chews through the initial denial stages of their grief. Despite its name seeming like some sort of indestructible forcefield holding back the wave of emotion, the denial stage brings its own world of hurt, as a desperate sense of normalcy teeters on the edge of collapse at every twist and turn. Unease enters Spirit in the Room through the spidery, noodling guitar parts that frequently outline crunchy, difficult chords. Replace these with a more typical guitar part given the rest of the instrumentals, and Activity would have themselves a melancholy yet not overly negative-feeling alt pop record. However, the introduction of a guitar straight out of Slint really pushes this record over the edge. This record doesn’t reach a resolution, much like those of us unfortunate enough to experience grief on this scale, but there’s a sense that Activity ends the record in a healthier and more realistic place than where they started. We may never vanquish the suspended chords in our lives, but we can at least incorporate them into our soundtracks to foster an even more beautiful future.

- Michael