After a long absence, I am back with one of my favourite albums by one of my all-time favourite artists, Lip Critic.

I am very happy this is a thing, generally because that means more material from this band, but also because it also varies their sound beyond that industrialness and loud dizziness you can find on their debut Lip Critic II or Hex Dealer, which by no means are bad and I have gotten quite used to, but this is just a nice refresher from those albums.

I liked both the varying intensity and energy here, with Charity Dinner being one of their more laidback songs and then Talon being basically a behemoth in its own right.

Next to the varying intensity you have the rather post-club focused My Blush (Strength of the Critic) and the disorienting Drumming with Izzy, but also Yard Sale (230 Take) which takes a sort of Punky attitude in their already unique musical talent.

Admittedly, not every song was perfect on first listen, because tracks like Shoplifting and 200 Bottles on Eviction needed a bit of growing on me, which thankfully they did, both are incredible.

Going back to comparing it with previous albums, i'm still deciding on which is the better of the both, because personally, while I am a sucker for noisy energetic stuff that is manic in nature, both albums fulfill different kinds of need really well. for me, Hex Dealer has the emotional value attached to it as that is one of the albums closest and dearest to me for getting me through dark times, however it is also quite in your face and slightly offputting at times if you aren't the crowd for it, whereas Theft World, while toned down to an extent, also just spreads its intensity high and low throughout, instead of being one continuous piece of LOUD.

Overall, another absolutely fantastic Lip Critic album that will be on rotation for many more weeks to come.