NEW MUSIC: Brand New, "The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me"

3 1/2 stars

(Interscope/Tiny Evil)

Intense, haunting, and reminiscent of your awful prom night, Brand New returns with their lyrically smart, emo-laced rock concoctions that promise to reunite you with your darker side.

Their new album, “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me,” is their third studio album after debut “Your Favorite Weapon” and 2003’s mainstream success, “Deja Entendu.” This new album marks the major label debut for the Long Island band.

Typically classified under the broadening genre of emo, Brand New writes songs with wit and sarcasm that transcends stereotypical Dashboard whining and instead conveys a convincing melancholy, reminding you that perhaps the world isn’t always as perfect as it seems.

“The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me” follows in this tradition but offers a potent, less polished version of their sound. Foregoing the long, clever track titles of “Deja Entendu” (“Good To Know That If I Ever Need Attention All I Have To Do Is Die,” “Sic Transit Gloria…Glory Fades”) in favor of short, concise names, the album’s lyrics, while still catchy, lack some of Brand New’s previous ego and cuteness. Even the album cover evokes a slightly creepy, “Donnie Darko”-esque sense of loneliness and isolation.

The album opener, “Sowing Season [Yeah],” begins with quiet guitar chords and lead singer Jesse Lacey’s voice. Another guitar chimes in crisply just moments before the simple chorus of “Yeah!” and a bended guitar line—the song’s surefire hook—accompanies it.

“Milestone,” a beautiful track that rues the loss of passing time and the degradation of relationships, serves as a nice lead into the soft yet driving track “Jesus Christ.” The song sounds like a peaceful yet cynical prayer. The chorus, like on the first track, experiments with the bending of guitar chords and a wavering vocal line.

This quieter track marks a turn in the album, which becomes pointedly louder and much angrier. “Degausser” reestablishes Brand New as the champions of the artfully screamed chorus, and “Limousine” strikes a fine balance between eerie melody and seething rage.

The simple, repeated notes and accompanying strings of “You Won’t Know,” lull you into a false sense of security before Lacey and his bandmates explode with a harmonic, shrieking power that typifies the beauty of their music.

The high-pitched verses of “Not The Sun” sounds almost like a tribute to Wolf Parade, and the bridge in and of itself seems like a Brand New experiment. Next comes a longer track, “Luca,” with Lacey singing in a falsetto reminiscent of Oasis’ Liam Gallagher. This section of the song ends with soft, acoustic poetry, which quickly gets shattered by cringing distortion and guitar soloing.

The album’s final track, “Handcuffs,” is a chilling song that starts with an acoustic riff and adds layers as it progresses, its angry lyrics weighted by death. Now that they’ve attained larger corporate success, Lacey’s final words on the album tell us, “It’s hard to be the better man / when you’re still lying, you’re still lying.”

“The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me” is not a deviation for Brand New but a distillation of their intensity and melodic beauty. They have exchanged some of their sing-song wit for raw feeling, making their major label debut a maturation rather than a sellout.