From Bandcamp, “On only their second full-length record, STILL has captured the intensity, tension, and emotion of the incredibly difficult circumstances surrounding its creation. Grief, desperation, and the weight of injustice from life's all-too-common cruelty seep into every moment of every track. Unpredictable and unorthodox, the album blurs the lines between contemporary avant-garde black metal, chaotic hardcore, and experimental noise, resulting in a stunning and deeply affecting work.” The album has eight songs.

“Yearn” is first. Dissonant strings bring an ominous sound, but that is nothing compared to the devastating weight of hopelessness that follows. It’s like a thick slab of ice that covers everything around. “Only Time Will Tell” roars out of the gates with a menacing anger, fueled by meaty riffs, galloping drums, thick bass notes, and horrid vocals. Although the sound is still dissonant, there are also some melodies buried within. “Light” is in fact, the antithesis of the title. There is only darkness, nightmares, and a general feeling of hopelessness that you can’t shake. The gravity of the situation is nearly crushing. “Dark” hears some Progressive element sneak in, particularly within the deft meter shifts. The sound so far borders on chaos, but the band keeps a tight control, so the wheels don’t come off the moving vehicle.

“Life Eclipses Living” features both distortion and dissonance in equal doses. The bass and drums march together in a cadence that brings horror with it…the kind that causes you to want to close your eyes and ears. “Small Mercies of Falling Apart” reminds me that sometimes it’s better to lose control and let whatever is going to happen, happen as it was meant to be. It’s a frightening experience, but one that we all must undergo from time to time. “Unresolved” closes the album, and in many ways, it represents what the album is pushing…a sense that nothing in your life is resolved, and you spend every waking moment trying to rectify that. But it's like taking a step forward, and then two backwards. It’s futility personified in many different ways, and it builds with a stealthy crescendo that crashed on you in the end.

Listening to “A Theft” is like standing at the edge of a storm-ravaged shoreline, waves crashing with relentless force. There is no rescue, and the album is a descent—deliberate, slow, and all-encompassing. You’re left with that rare kind of stillness, the kind that makes you reflect on everything unresolved, every ache left unhealed. It’s an album that doesn’t just convey hopelessness but forces you to confront it, to sit with it, and to understand its unyielding power. Hopelessness isn’t merely a word; it’s an experience, a place the artist invites you to visit and perhaps, a reminder that sometimes it’s the darkness that makes us fully see.