Album Review: Rarity – The Longest Lonesome

Rarity‘s latest full length “The Longest Lonesome” is set to be released on the 30th August 2019 via New Damage Records, the album is a product of the upheaval and uncertainty the band have faced over the last few years. Rarity have faced legal struggles, illness, strained relationships and the departure of two founding members, but they have emerged with a newly cemented and settled line up and a fresh lease on life, albeit one that somewhat unsurprisingly heads into darker and heavier territory than their previous full length “I Couldn’t Be Weaker“.

They Kick things off with the dark atmospheric introduction of the album’s title track, Rarity slowly build up the expectation before the album launches into ‘Shawinigan‘, a pulverising slab of post hardcore that sets their stall out nicely. “Hurting” maintains the album’s darker tone but melodically it dips its metaphorical toes into pop punk to create an energetic moment of dark pop. “The Longest Lonesome” is a constantly moving target, you think you have the album sussed and it heads off at another tangent, the tone always remains dark but the style and intensity relentlessly shifts.

Constantly veering between it’s poppier more accessible moments, through bruising punk rock and abrasive alt rock to crushing post hardcore, “The Longest Lonesome” is the equivalent of a movie boxer, constantly bettered and bruised yet always resilient and rising from the canvas to deliver that final knock out blow. There’s no doubting that Rarity have been through a lot in the last few years and you get the feeling that sheer bloody minded defiance is what has kept them going, “The Longest Lonesome” comes across a cathartic album, one that channels the events of the last few years, rather than letting events destroy them Rarity have come out swinging.