Nothing seems easy anymore. Little by little, life has reached a point where everything is a struggle and everything takes a toll—even the stuff you love. It feels like there’s a price to pay for just existing, that it’s impossible to not be sucked into the capitalistic mechanics of the modern world. That feeling of uncertainty and discomfort is hard enough in day-to-day life, but it’s exacerbated if you’re in a band, because that’s harder today than it ever has been. It’s something Chamber have tangible experience of, and something the Nashville band address directly on their third full-length album, this is goodbye….
The five-piece—who, after a string of EPs, released debut album Cost Of Sacrifice in 2020, and its follow-up, A Love To Kill For, in 2023—took the ominous title of this record from a lyric on “in revolving doors”, the record’s final song. Its portentous finality is present throughout all of its twelve tracks, however.
“Any band that's trying to get out of just playing local shows and actually tour,” says guitarist/vocalist Gabe Manuel, “has to be involved in what I refer to as the rat race of competing for people's attention—online and trying to play shows. And that took a toll on me personally. I love spending time with my friends in Chamber. We love each other very much, but the toll of being on tour, sleeping in the van every night—and wondering if you've made the right choice by making what you're doing your primary creative focus—can weigh heavy. If there’s a theme to the record, it's us reckoning with that—and deciding that we are doing the right thing, and that it is worth the bullshit that you go through being in a band.”
It may have been something of a difficult and uncertain journey coming to that conclusion, but this is goodbye… is an emphatic middle finger to those doubts, and a full-hearted confirmation that, yes, it is indeed all worth it. Because despite the struggle of it all (or perhaps as a result of it) Manuel and the rest of the band—bassist Chris Smith, drummer Taylor Carpenter, vocalist Jacob Lilly and guitarist Henry Dierig—have made a record that not only defies and transcends those difficulties, but reaffirms the importance of this band and the role it plays in their lives for each of them.
“To maintain the band as a creative outlet,” says Manuel, “and as a way to spend time with each other—that's the way that I value it the most. It being a vehicle for us to express ourselves but also mostly getting to be in the van together and laugh and have fun.”
That laughter and fun aren’t really present on this record, but the band hold nothing back when it comes to expressing themselves. Before the wild frenzy of opener “arms of eternity” kicks things off, there’s a brief quote, read by one of the band’s friends, that sets the dark tone for the rest of the album: ‘Forever is too much for a soul to endure.’ The phrase was actually intended to be a lyric in the song itself, but the band couldn’t find a way to make it fit—and so instead it became an introduction of sorts, one of a few snippets that pepper the record and help make the fully-realized album that it is. And indeed, the blistering, intense rage—what Chamber themselves term their “psychotic mosh metal"—that follows over the next half hour so is one of the most intense, cathartic things you’ll hear. Not just all year, either. For a long time.
While that first audio clip was made specifically for this album, the original purpose of the one found at the end of the coruscating, disjointed and discordant metalcore of “Angel” has its origins in the tragedy of real life.
“That recording,” explains Manuel, “is actually from the funeral of my friend who passed away, and who the song is about. I've wanted to use that clip for years and that just seemed like the perfect opportunity.”
It adds extra gravitas to an already heavy—in every sense of the word—song. But it also bridges the gap into the moody, doom-laden “pale blue (why?)”, which sounds like the Earth opening up and collapsing in on itself. There is, it tells you, no escape from your fate. Elsewhere, “violins” is a scattergun of violent noise, “parting gift” a vicious squall of self-doubt and existential anguish, and “resurrect”—which features Vincent Bennett, vocalist of The Acacia Strain—a relentless shadow of chugging darkness.
Produced and recorded by longtime collaborator Randy LeBoeuf, this is goodbye… isn’t an easy listen, but that was never the intention. The intention was to suck you into its weird, messed up world and rebuke both its own title and the inspiration for it in the process. That’s something LeBoeuf knew inherently how to orchestrate and achieve.
“I had heard legends of Randy for years before we did A Love To Kill For,” says Dierig, who joined the band just before that album, and wasn’t anywhere near as involved in its creative process as he was with this one. “All of Chamber were like, 'Dude, you've got to meet Randy, you've got to work with Randy.' He just knows exactly what we're doing. Because we're a weird band, and I think not everyone would know immediately how to approach what we want to do. But he takes it all completely in stride. We'll show him the most hilarious fucked up guitar part with a drum beat that makes no sense and he's like, 'Oh yeah, hold on, give me 30 seconds' and just figures out what we're doing.”
“He's a music theory nerd,” adds Manuel. “He loves jazz, loves any opportunity to get granular about fucked up time signatures and stuff like that, so I feel he really relishes the opportunity to mess around with that kind of stuff with us because he has such a good mind for it.”
The result, almost a decade into the band’s career, is the album they’ve always been striving to make. It’s shocking, challenging, savage, but it’s also vital and necessary. And no, it’s very much not a goodbye. In fact, it feels much more like the start of something.
“This is the record that I've always wanted us to make,” says Manuel. “And I think it is, thus far, the definitive statement in terms of what we want to sound like and what we want to offer.”
“I agree,” Dierig says. “I never understood when bands would say, 'Oh, this is our most mature sound to date.' I never really knew what that meant, so I always thought it was kind of corny. Obviously, I can't speak on The Cost Of Sacrifice or the earlier EPs, but as a fan of those, even before I joined the band, this direction feels like it suits us the most. I'm really proud of that and I'm really happy to be a part of it. I'm very excited to put it out and tour on it. I really want to play all these parts live!”
