In the winter of 2013, guitarist Kerry McCoy and vocalist George Clarke — founding members of black metal innovators Deafheaven — went into the studio to record what would eventually come their breakthrough album Sunbather. Armed with home-recorded demos and high ambitions, they were ready, but they were scared as hell.
"I just wanted to make sure that the record was like... not perfect... but like, really on point," McCoy said in a 2013 promo video.
Although their debut album, 2011's Roads to Judah, had succeeded in raising a few eyebrows, Deafhaven were still figuring out who and what exactly they were. Clarke and McCoy were still living in San Francisco, still working terrible jobs, and doing whatever they could to pay the bills, and music was their only way out of this life. They wanted their next record to be on point simply because it had to be.
On June 10, their savior came into the world. An album of beautiful contradictions,Sunbather became one of the most important rock releases of the decade. Nothing about the album — from its layered arrangements that blend black metal with post-rock, pop, and shoegaze, to its pink, sun-kissed album art — fit neatly into what black metal (or any genre for that matter) was considered to be.
Along with new drummer Daniel Tracey, McCoy and Clarke reached for the heavens from within their own personal hell. And that's what Sunbather does so well: finding light within the cracks of darkness. From the epic opener "Dream House" to the gorgeous, knee-buckling closer "The Pecan Tree," the album is in constant motion, shifting back and forth between dreamy post-rock, immense nuclear explosiveness, and cathartic payoffs. Its songs move with a churning fluidity, building to a climax before they crumble again. Clarke's sharp, piercing howls along with McCoy’s cascading avalanche of guitars and Tracey's rapid-fire bursts of drums together created an energy so grand, it could move mountains.
At the heart of Sunbather is a deeply personal album told from the perspective of people yearning to live in peace. Lyricist Clarke would gaze into San Francisco's many penthouse apartments on his walk home after a long day at work, wondering what it would be like to live obviously and carefree. On the album’s title track, a Cohen-esque narrator drives through an affluent neighborhood, only to become more depressed at the sight of a young woman lying on the grass among the green trees.
While the lyrics are mostly indecipherable on record, if you take the time to look up what’s being said, you’ll find that Clarke’s words grapple with insecurity, the ability (or inability) to love, and whether there is a better life out there waiting. The album is vulnerable, romantic, and personal. As Clarke put it in 2013, "Sunbather is like ripping pages out of my journal."
With its shrieking vocals and thrashing guitars, black metal is raw, brutal, and by nature, not easily accessible. Born out of Norway in the 1980s, bands like Mayhem, Emperor, and Darkthrone toiled in dark, gruesome imagery and some questionable values. Their music sounded as if it came straight from the depths of hell. They sing about war, destruction, and death; the loud, intense music is meant to invoke a sense of dread. It’s not for the faint of heart, and its bands can be quite intimidating. For devotees, that’s part of the appeal. Being in black metal means surrounding yourself in the darkness; you either get it, or you don’t.
At face value, it makes sense that Deafheaven would be categorized as black metal. Their music can be just as intense as any other band in the genre, but the emotional depth and nakedness on Sunbather is part of what separates Deafheaven from their peers. It’s a different kind of intensity that leaves room for warmth and hope, and ultimately broadened their appeal beyond the black metal scene.
They bared their souls in a way most metal bands would not dare, choosing not to hide behind corpse face paint or technical prowess. The members of Deafheaven didn’t play the part of a stereotypical Scandinavian metal band: They didn’t have long, flowing hair; they wore skinny jeans and Vans sneakers. Their singer could’ve been a model in a different life, and because they were so clean-cut, Deafheaven were accused of being hipster posers who didn’t make "real" metal music.
A "true" black metal band would not reach for the rafters like U2 as they do in the "Dream House" finale, nor would their interludes call to mind Wilco or Oasis. A real metal group wouldn't listen to Drake, an artist Deafheaven has admitted to being fans of and whose music touches upon similar themes.
As a result Deafheaven were immediately cast as outsiders in their own scene.
Whereas the scope of Sunbather might have displeased hardcore metalheads, the album's accessibility inadvertently opened new doors for black metal, a genre traditionally against any sort of evolution or deviation. By making heavy music that reflected the music they consumed, Deafhaven became one of the first bands to dismantle genre-gatekeeping.
Indeed, Sunbather is just as indebted to My Bloody Valentine and Explosions in the Sky as it is Emperor’s black metal classic In the Nightside Eclipse. Sunbather used black metal as a vehicle to amplify a vast palate of emotion.
For its wide appeal and depth, Sunbather received significant acclaim in 2013 from all ends of the critical spectrum. The album appeared at the top of numerous year-end best of lists, and has since been named one of the 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time by Rolling Stone.
In an era before streaming allowed easy access to a myriad of musical styles, genre-bending albums like Sunbather were still relatively novel, and even more so in hard rock circles. Sunbather provided the blueprint for bands like Turnstile, whose latest album GLOW ON has seen them to outgrow the similarly cloistered hardcore scene they were brought up in. But Deafheaven's influence can be heard broadly, through the work of artists as diverse as Bartees Strange, Lil Yachty and Taylor Swift — each of whom have boldly embraced genre fluidity.
In the 10 years since Sunbather, Deafheaven have become one of metal’s most vital bands, and continue to change the way we think about the genre. The band have continued to shape-shift with each album release: 2015’s New Bermuda saw them lean more into thrash metal, while 2018’s Ordinary Corrupt Human Love was a bit sunnier and slightly more indebted to '90s alternative rock. Their latest record, 2021's Infinite Granite, eschewed black metal all together in favor of a gentler, dreamier sound that has more in common with the Smiths than Cradle of Filth.
While Deafheaven continues to evolve and move further away from their black metal roots, Sunbather remains their crowning achievement. On that album, they somehow managed to blend oil and vinegar, creating a concoction of genres that remained true to their vision. It couldn’t have been more on point.
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