Infinite Granite
| Deafheaven
Infinite Granite
nfinite Granite is the fifth studio album by American band Deafheaven, released on August 20, 2021, through Sargent House. The album represents a dramatic departure from the black metal influences of the band's previous albums, and a shift toward a shoegazestyle with mostly clean vocals from frontman George Clarke. -Wikipedia
Critic Reviews
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Pitchfork
Abandoning black metal’s harsh intensity in favor of softer, gentler sounds, Deafheaven push themselves into surprising terrain. It’s a tricky proposition.
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Angry Metal Guy
Infinite Granite is the painful realization that Deafheaven and I have just grown too far apart. Which breaks my fucking heart (again). I respect the band’s direction, I respect the bravery to follow that direction, but I can’t pretend I love the results.
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Decibel Magazine
As with all of their past material, Deafheaven present a surfeit of ideas on Infinite Granite, albeit with a stronger organizational sense than OCHL.
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New Noise Magazine
Infinite Granite is a vibrant starburst of deep thoughts and happy smiles and there’s no denying its brilliance. It’s an album both radiant with warmth and nuanced enough for reflection. Every track is necessary. Every note is well-thought and appreciated. This is music that is so sad at heart that it soon beams with cathartic happiness. The depth of colour, the passion, the catchiness all make this a thoroughly captivating album that gets your hairs standing on end. Emotions run wild on Infinite Granite and your cold, black hearts should give it a go.
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Wall of Sound
Deafheaven have created a great alternative rock record, one that can easily compete with the modern-day dream pop/post-punk groups like Beach House, DIIV and Interpol. Though ultimately they have sacrificed what made them originally standout from a vast majority of their peers, and it’s hard to not be a little disappointed by its lack of visceral intensity. To judge it solely as a singular body of work, Infinite Granite is a bold, impressive album that has the potential to take them from being critical darlings to alt-rock heroes. Only time will tell if their already devoted fanbase will go along with them for the ride.
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Paste Magazine
Only a hint of the Bay Area band’s black metal roots remain on their excellent fifth album.
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The Guardian
rock at its most majestically beautiful.
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Kerrang!
To some, Infinite Granite is a further step away from what they want. To others, a step further into it. For Deafheaven, it’s simply who they are. Truthfully, it’s who they’ve always been. No surprises here.
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The Quietus
It’s the perfect way to underline and emphasise the fact that Deafheaven are still Deafheaven, their grand spectrum of colours and emotions still firmly intact – and they can use them to paint as vividly as ever. While perhaps not as original or unpredictable as their previous monoliths, Infinite Granite is undoubtedly another epic, engrossing and engulfing piece.
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Post-Trash
It’s beautiful and fiery, like we’ve always known the band to be. When the wall of feedback finally cuts out and you’re left with nothing but the ringing in your ears, remember that moment. That’s a feeling.
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NME
The San Franciscan band's fifth album is an about-turn, eschewing the black metal that made their name in favour of hazy guitar and vulnerable lyrics.
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PopMatters
Deafheaven’s Infinite Granite is a very successful shoegaze-inspired alt-rock record with a great sense of dynamics and some really catchy songs.
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Variety
A year into their second decade, Deafheaven have launched an entirely new chapter — they can go absolutely anywhere from here.
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Distorted Sound Magazine
This is a bold, adventurous step into new pastures that still fundamentally feels like a DEAFHEAVEN album, and for that they deserve acclaim.
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Treblezine
Infinite Granite is a welcome shift for Deafheaven, one that delivers grand emotion, exhilaration, and beauty.
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The Line of Best Fit
Deafheaven’s rage collides with delicacy on the grandiose Infinite Granite.
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Beats Per Minute
Infinite Granite feels less like an abandonment, and more like a new era – a rebirth that fans can either jump on or off for.
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Stereogum
I expected to hate Infinite Granite. But friends, that didn’t happen. The opposite happened. Friends, I love it.
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Clash Magazine
There’s no doubting Deafheaven are a band exploring their own sonic capabilities, and they should be applauded for treading their own path, but it’s the heaviest parts of the record that feel like the band are really hitting their stride - the glorious final two minutes of album closer 'Mombasa' a fine example - which make you kind of wish that they’d just do a whole album in that mode.
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Flood Magazine
Infinite Granite’s best tracks unfurl slowly before dropping a tumult of guitars, bass, and drums when you least expect them.
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The Ringer
'Infinite Granite' Is a Beautiful Pivot.
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The Alternative
Since their debut it’s been clear Deafheaven could excel at any sound they attempted. It shouldn’t take Infinite Granite to demonstrate their talent, but what a masterclass it is.
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The Revue
Through the electrifying static, peace is finally found. And a great band has fully embraced the other side of the darkness.
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25YL
Infinite Granite deserves similar recognition for different reasons: while maybe it’s not an album of the year contender, it’s a momentous occasion for Deafheaven, and far more than a footnote.
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No Ripcord
But it is to say that the great moments on Infinite Granite hit you like a shower of freshly fallen leaves in deep woods, as opposed to a barrage of sunbeams and foamy waves on a beach.
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Rock Sins
This is a record that must be heard in full. Those who may have been disappointed with the singles, but love the band’s previous output must put the hour aside to listen in full. If you do that and still don’t love the new direction? Fair enough. But to reject this offering on the singles alone is to reject a gourmet meal for distaste of the table’s bread.
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V13
Love it or hate it, Infinite Granite is the sound of Deafheaven being Deafheaven. If you’re a true fan of the band, it won’t take you long before the beautiful sounds of this record get under your skin. While there are still faint splashes of the black metal fury woven into the sound, the majority of Infinite Granite couldn’t at the furthest point from that. Tapping more into the Radiohead-esque moods of their sound, Deafheaven, in keeping with all of their work to date, has created a piece of art that will simply leave you speechless.
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SF Sonic
Infinite Granite is another strong record and it is probably the most important record the band has made as it demonstrates their skills and their ambition stretch far beyond that of a regular metal band.
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Proghurst
Whatever the answer is, to me, it’s a sign of optimism. Described in a single comparison: ‘Infinite Granite’ is to Deafheaven what ‘Shelter’ was to Alcest. Or in more precise terms, a Blackgaze band going full Shoegaze for an album.
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AV Club
Infinite Granite is easy on the ears, a lush and transporting listen, but it also runs together in a way previous albums from this band—with their hills of jagged intensity and valleys of, yes, heavenly beauty—really didn’t.
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Backseat Mafia
Blackgaze greats opt for natural evolution over a full 180 on their fifth full-length.
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Sputnik Music
One thing’s for certain: whatever legacy this album has will rest more on the band’s poster boy credentials than on anything groundbreaking it adds to shoegaze’s drowsy yesterday-empire but hey, odds are you knew that already.
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The Skinny
Deafheaven round off some of their metallic edges on their new album Infinite Granite, and prove that you don't have to shout loud to hit hard.
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Brooklyn Vegan
Infinite Granite feels like a fresh start for Deafheaven, and their future looks as bright right now as it did when Sunbather first came out.
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Peanut Butter Pope
The sonic switch-up of ‘Infinite Granite’ has many merits; the atmospheres are sublime, giving off a sense of exploration even beyond Deafheaven’s own musical exploration, as if we’re being blasted into the galactic unknown thanks to one rock band’s ache for adventure.
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The Needle Drop
Infinite Granite finds Deafheaven eschewing the blackened aspect of their sound in favor of boilerplate shoegaze and post-rock.
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Under the Radar Magazine
As before, there will probably be talk about what this band is, or should be; what genre conventions it fits into, and so on—it’s shown that it doesn’t care about any of that, and this album is a riposte to the doubters as Deafheaven morphs once again, into quite possibly the best version of itself.
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Echoes and Dust
Infinite Granite is going to be another album of the year. Fuck it, Infinite Granite by Deafheaven is one of the finest albums ever recorded.
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Hardbeat
Infinite Granite represents both a dramatic shift for Deafheaven, and brings into focus their true strengths. This is a band who excel in creating an ocean of sound to bathe in. While previous efforts have seen them achieve this by overtly blending the extreme with the luscious, here they take a far more subtle route but one that on the whole is far more effective. Some will no doubt be disappointed at the scaling back of the black metal, but by bravely casting off those shackles Deafheaven have shown they still have far more room to grow than anyone initially thought.
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Ghost Cult Magazine
By the time the gentle instrumental number ‘Neptune Raining Diamonds’ passes you by you sit in wonder at what else Infinite Granite could have in store. Will I catch some verbal shrapnel for defending Deafheaven’s track record? Sure, but I didn’t lie. Give Infinite Granite a try. I think you’ll like the drive.
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In Review Online
This is perhaps the hidden objective behind this arduous excursion: by demonstrating how placid their music could be, it’ll make listeners want more of the same and feel ashamed for ever demanding more. Mission accomplished, I guess?
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Exclaim!
Prominent on its cosmic cover art, in its lyrics and tone, Infinite Granite is remarkably blue, and beautifully so. Some fans might not appreciate the direction the band has taken towards the light, but nevertheless, the heart of Deafheaven remains. Deafheaven's fury and anguish has always had a companion in melancholy, introspection and their openness to explore. On Infinite Granite, they continue that journey, softening, brightening, and elevating themselves to shimmering cerulean skies, sometimes still pulling through storms, at home in a new world.
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Louder
fifth album struggles to hold up.
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The Razor's Edge
Whether this is a one off or the road that Deafheaven will pursue further in the future will remain to be seen but Infinite Granite is most certainly a beautiful collection of music.
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Deviant Art
Extreme metals fans will probably not like this, and nor will the most nitpicky of Deafheaven's fanbase, but if you keep in mind that this band can still sound like themselves no matter what they do, this is an album to jump into with no fears of what's to transpire.
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Everything Is Noise
Infinite Granite puts its listener through a lot, and it’s all the better for it. Deafheaven has never catered to any expectations or assumptions, and I have nothing but the utmost admiration towards them and their mindset of doing things the way they see fit, and somehow pulling it off every single time. While I was personally left with a few gaps unfilled when it comes to needing certain aggression and bleakness, it’s alright.
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Loud And Quiet
Really, this is a Slowdive album by a band who usually sound more like Ash Borer – but as much as it seems like Deafheaven are not your black metal band anymore, Infinite Granite shows that they never really cared enough to have the argument anyway.
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Punktastic
'Infinite Granite’ is the best record of the year so far, any competition falling so far behind it’s barely worth them taking part.
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The Sleeping Shaman
The irony of course by embracing this sound whole heartedly is that they will fuel the fire of the ‘not black metal brigade’ who never considered them black metal in the first place. Rather than get drawn into that elitist crap, just listen to Infinite Granite with an open mind and appreciate its beauty.
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Noizze UK
Infinite Granite is very much a record that will linger in your mind well after it’s close. It’s a record that will be probed, explored and analysed for years to come, and ultimately, it’s a majestic record that only solidifies Deafhaven as one of the most exciting and unique bands to be found in guitar based music.
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DIY Magazine
A record to get lost in.
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Scene Point Blank
I really hope the band continue on this musical avenue for the foreseeable future. To me it feels like they’re doing a much better job in this area and quite frankly, I feel like Infinite Granite is one of the best albums of this year too. I wholeheartedly recommend this record to anyone looking to just drift and dream effortlessly – it’s as simple as that.
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The Glasglow Guardian
Regardless of Deafheaven’s clear efforts to market Infinite Granite as a revitalisation of their sound, it simply doesn’t live up to the hype. It certainly has its moments, and there are glimmers of greatness throughout the tracklist, but it isn’t the drastic sonic shift that I and many others were hoping for. For a band that truly purports to have moved on and matured in sound, Deafheaven still appear to be clinging to vestiges of their past.
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The Thin Air
Yes, an impressionistic painting is an apt comparison for Infinite Granite. It’s no doubt gorgeous at surface level, but the longer you look, the less you see. Not without its highlights, the band has never sounded more accessible, but beyond the skin deep beauty of the record, there’s not a whole lot else to behold.
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