REVIEW: The Rapture - In the Grace of Your Love

The Rapture - In the Grace of Your Love
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It’s been five years since New York dance-punk outfit The Rapture released their last album, 2006’s underappreciated Pieces of the People We Love. The band’s latest, In the Grace of Your Love, is their third full-length album and the first without bassist and singer Matt Safer. And while most bands might take the departure of an integral member as a strike against the future, The Rapture pushed on and continued to evolve their sound – and they sound as confident as ever.

The Rapture’s 2003 full-length debut, Echoes, was raw, rough around the edges, but sharp with attitude and conviction, spurring on movement from dancefloors to bedrooms alike – anywhere could be a dancefloor with that record. It shook with the soul of garage rock and the spirited pulse of dance music. The band cleaned up their sound a bit on their major label debut, Pieces of the People We Love, but kept their distinctive, unpretentious approach in tact. On In the Grace of Your Love, the band finds a happy median with an album that’s well produced – but not over-produced – and that displays an ambition for a larger, more impactful sound.

The charm of The Rapture has always been that despite producing dance-oriented music, they don’t play to perfection with an overly polished sound – it’s that rough, garage quality that gives their grooves bite and an added kick. Luckily, the loss of Safer and long gap between albums didn’t let Luke Jenner (vocals and guitar), Vito Roccoforte (drums and percussion), and Gabriel Andruzzi (keyboards, saxophone, bass guitar, percussion and vocals) lose the heart of the band. “Blue Bird” is thunderous with its tom drum rolls, storm of snare hits, and massive guitar bends; it has a bit of ‘70s hard rock flair to it as well as power pop gusto. “In the Grace of Your Love” demonstrates the band’s ability to cross a variety of rhythms to create a hook out of an engaging, well-layered beat; it’s all the more compelling with the bits of soul lining the vocal melody. Things pick right back up with the following track, “Never Die Again,” which sees the band playing with disco and the infatuation with one special lady. First single “How Deep Is Your Love?” is one of the best songs of the year, taking advantage of every one of its six minutes: a fusion of disco, electropop, punk, and jazz. Album closer “It Takes Time To Be A Man” is a relaxed, deep cut that sounds almost as if it were a lost Motown single with its light, ascending piano line, smooth stepping bass, and supportive saxophones.

While the band’s aim for a bigger, more comprehensive sound certainly results in a number of great new songs, it also occasionally hinders the album from being consistently effective, briefly slowing down the collection’s overall momentum on three tracks. “Sail Away” is a standout, opening the album on a high note with its wall of synthesizers and Jenner’s emphatic delivery, it loses momentum as it concludes with a collage of saxophone riffs that does nothing to complement the song or establish the following track – it just sounds random. A few tracks later, the momentum is back and high up until the halfway point of “Come Back To Me” when the song drops out and shifts both its pace and tone. The shift would have worked as an outro but it winds up sounding as if the band is attempting to remix the song before it’s even over. “Roller Coaster” has good intentions with its reverb-dressed vocal harmonies and rolling percussion, but it winds up being repetitive and downplays the talents of the members, subtracting from the album’s overall success.

In the Grace of Your Love grows on you, but it never completely achieves its potential. As the introduction to a new era for The Rapture, it’s a strong foot forward and a reminder that The Rapture are conscious of both rhythm and content. Here, the band continues to prove that there’s a reason to dance in the good and bad moments of life – there’s grace even in the chaos that might sometimes surround us. They remind us – or maybe even teach some of us – that there’s a rhythm to everything; the key is to find the dance. In the Grace of Your Love upholds the band's legacy and maintains their endearing sense of honesty and loose feel that can loosen the tie around the neck of dance music and help you dance the worry away.

In the Grace of Your Love is out today on DFA.

The Rapture - "How Deep Is Your Love?"


The Rapture - "It Takes Time To Be A Man"