• Band Name: Isis
  • Record Label: Ipecac
  • Release Date: May 5, 2009
Wavering Radiant Image
Metascore

Generally favorable reviews - based on 21 Critics What's this?

User Score

Universal acclaim- based on 27 Ratings

  • Summary: The fifth album for the Los Angeles rock band was produced by Joe Barresi.
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 17 out of 21
  2. Negative: 0 out of 21
  1. Isis’s four previous full-lengths have clear story arcs, but Wavering Radiant’s themes are open to interpretation, giving it added appeal. Close to perfect.
  2. Wavering Radiant works as a single piece of music rather than a series of songs, and it is cohesively played by an ensemble that is more interested in the dark majesty of metal than its potential for expressing anger.
  3. It’s a proper album, in the sense that a divide is made at four of seven, the title track a segue between halves – its makers clearly bear download culture little respect, constructing their latest so that it’s best experienced as a whole, bridging arrangements as vital as the blustering bombast and constitutional inflections of grandly designed standout pieces.
  4. It’s testament to their power that an average Isis album is still pretty good.

See all 21 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4 out of 5
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 5
  3. Negative: 1 out of 5
  1. adam
    10
    Best album of the year one of the best in this decade and maybe just the best isis has ever been.
  2. after the atmopsheric sludge that they perfected three albums prior, continuing along that path would have been a sub-par move from a vastly superior band. And Isis just can't have that. Apparently, they discovered that subtle nuances can be just as effective as the walls of sound they are accustomed to, and the combination of these two factors make for the most interesting listen yet. Small, "tool-isms" stand alongside the mammoth riffs of Aaron Turner and co.
    Also, Aaron's vocals are spot on throughout all of this record, balancing his shouts with the cleans perfectly.
    The best Isis record ever. What a send off.
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  3. GiselleB
    10
    Fantastic Album!
  4. ChampiodiPi
    2
    When a band's philosophy centres around the same basic premise, one in which they are encouraged to retread and retry, you feel that the band is desperately treading this same path hoping that luck instead of providence, that hope instead of prudence sees all the peices fit and that "elusive masterpiece" may be stumbled upon. There is nothing in this world as loathsome as try-hards with scant ability hoping to get lucky, and this is where we find Isis. Never managing to top their début with the same trite idea and same conventions and structure appearing again and again. Isis are the proverbial Sisyphus curse, condemning their fan base to endure the same nonsense for all eternity but ironically lap it all up oblivious to the bands all too obvious flaws. Collapse

See all 5 User Reviews