Balancing depth and sublimity, the new album cements Mother Mother’s “Goddamn Staying Power,” as it’s framed on track eight of Grief Chapter. As Mother Mother’s legacy of risk continuously amplifies their resonance, bandmates Molly Guldemond, Jasmin Parkin, Ali Siadat, and Mike Young form an alliance to challenge the rigid structures of indie rock, taking their biggest leap yet with the album’s 12 songs. The project opens with the funeral procession drums of “Nobody Escapes” while “The Matrix” sings a lullaby towards the end of life. A crypt keeper sits on the decaying front porch of “Days” and finger picks its banjo towards finality. They’ll play these tracks in an inaugural Rogers Arena Vancouver performance this summer and will continue on a world tour from South America to Australia. 

Grief Chapter’s power is in touching on the world’s unanimous certainty. Listeners will find comfort in the tracks’ admittance, soothed by the familiarity of the band’s twangy guitars and sibling harmonies. “Death is loud right now,” says the in-tune Guldemond. His hope for the album is “to offer a powerful, positive reference point.” As it becomes available for soundtracking our life experiences, fans everywhere can turn to the album as a sixth stage of grief. 

“But then again, it’s just music.”

— Ryan Guldemond

“But then again, it’s just music,” Guldemond reels in. The band’s intent is for the music “to wash over listeners. The vibrations alone are medicine.” He sharply differentiates how thematically “death and grief rooted themselves in these songs, but not morosely.” 

Guldemond is delighted when I ask him to predict his own death. Like the energy he brings to the stage and the early morning conversation which stirs mortality into mugs of black coffee, he’d like to pass “awake, wide-eyed, and smiling.”