Poppy undoubtedly flew under the radar of the heavy crowd for much of her early career. The YouTuber seemed quite far removed with her android shtick and early material. Then 2020’s I Disagree came in with it’s eclectic and chaotic approach with songs like “Concrete” and “Bite Your Teeth,” entering the heavy music space with no concern for musical boundaries. It was an impressive and unpredictable album that ping-ponged between modern metal, industrial, and pop with a unique flavor. While her follow-ups in Flux and Zig saw her move into alt rock and electro-pop, recent collaborations with Knocked Loose and Bad Omens seemed to hint at her moving back into heavier waters. With Negative Spaces, that turned out to be mostly true.
In typical Poppy fashion, there’s genre-blurring all over the place. It’s undoubtedly heavy, unified by the Jordan Fish production, but it’s rarely straight-forward. Opener “have you had enough?” begins with murky electronic elements and explodes into almost NIN-inspired industrial rhythms and grooves. It ultimately culminates with speaker-filling chugs and Poppy switching into full-on screams. In contrast, it’s followed up by early single “the cost of giving up,” with it’s melodic riffing and hook-filled chorus, leading up to another corrosive bout of downtuned riffing and scathing screams, sounding very much akin to what’s going around in modern metal and rock. That said, “they’re all around us” wastes no time getting right to the more brutal moments. Industrial-laced guitar riffing and screams get the blood pumping before a more serene chorus offers an excellent contrast. The first of three short transition tracks moves us into “crystallize,” a foray into more electronic and less heavy waters. More electropop than anything else, the pounding synths will drill their way into your skull upon first listen. “vidal” keeps up the pop elements and fuses it with more of a rock base, at times almost sounding like something from the early Avril Lavigne catalog.
With the middle of the album pushing a more electronic, pop-driven tone, “push go” bridges the gap sonically to swerve back towards heavier ground with more industrial buzzing, leading into the nu-metal grooving of “nothing” which swells with more dark electro elements bubbling below the surface until the screams pick back up. An absolutely soaring chorus offers a real bright spot for the entire album. Those familiar with her work on Knocked Loose’s “Suffocate” will be thrilled by “the center’s falling out,” which almost feels like the spiritual successor to that visceral, unrelenting track which features a crushing breakdown towards its finale. After the second transition cut, the title track flirts more with grunge than anything else, while “surviving on defiance” utilizes more melancholic notes and dark pulsating grooves, allowing for a sense of dreary resolution before “new way out” brings back more immediately catchy riffing and electronics to the forefront while the lyrics cling to more darker thoughts. The album ends on a brighter note though with “halo” offering a more positive outlook, with it’s catchy ballad-esque approach and gentle electronic beats that build up to culminate into arguably the album’s prettiest moment.
Negative Spaces is an album that likes to flirt with boundaries when it’s not smashing through them. Far from a ‘traditional’ metal release, but one that’s remarkably heavy in both it’s sound and intent. Poppy has always had a unique vision with her sound, and this album seems to culminate much of her expression and experimentation. Given her trajectory, it’s better not to guess where she’s heading in the future as she’s completely unattached to genre, but open-minded fans of heavy music are bound to find something worth celebrating with Negative Spaces.