Her lavender soprano just barely brushes against the rotted-out trap beat of “Sadist,” and it’s so outmatched by the raved-up synths of closer “Their Kindness Is Charade” that the effect is heartbreaking. Though she lacks Glass’ violent temperament and scorched-earth conviction, she possesses a more controlled, refined voice that shines on Amnesty’s dreamier tracks, particularly “Char,” the most openly emotional pop song Crystal Castles has ever done. Inheriting the unenviable task of replacing one of the most singular frontwomen of the last decade, and under such tumultuous circumstances, new recruit Edith Frances proves more than capable. Of course, once again, Kath owes his success in part to a strong collaborator. Even though the band’s hostile electro-industrial fusion is less of a novelty than it was in 2008, nobody else is producing it quite like this, and Kath’s incinerating hellscapes are as jolting and tactfully concise as ever. Amnesty never tops what came before, but its best moments come impressively close.

As he attempts to make the case that Crystal Castles was his project all along, the new music does a better job bolstering his claims than any written statement ever could. (Is that photo of several nearly identical girls intended as commentary on how easily Kath believes women can be replaced?) Even the presumptuous (I) affixed to the title could be interpreted as a taunt, a sort of “there’s more to come” for anybody questioning the legitimacy of his new lineup.īut Kath’s never seemed too concerned about being cast as a villain bad press has trailed the group since its earliest days. Its cover certainly doesn’t make it feel any less gross. So Kath’s first Glass-less Crystal Castles album, Amnesty (I), arrives under uncomfortable circumstances. Never mind that she’s pictured right there on the cover of their first album, or that her name adorns one of their signature songs in Kath’s revisionist history of Crystal Castles, she made no meaningful contributions. To many, she was the group, yet the band’s current press material doesn’t make so much as a single mention of her. While it may be true that Glass was never the driving force behind Crystal Castles’ sound, on stage she was their star attraction, the group’s spiritual link to the punk community and the wild card that made their shows such a frightening spectacle (she always appeared on the cusp of coming to blows with anybody within reach).

But Kath didn’t just replace Glass he tried to scrub her from the band’s legacy. Just the mere act of continuing Crystal Castles seemed distasteful to many fans who’d assumed, as Glass had written, that her departure meant the end of the project.

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