Womb

Womb's confidence and eloquence proves that a more grown-up Purity Ring still has plenty of sparkle and wonder -- and makes a fine way to round out Roddick and James' first decade of making music together.

WOMB is uncomfortable yet poignant as an exploration of suffering and subsequent healing in a multifaceted way. Using fuzzy ambience, pitched-up vocals, and watery synths, this album takes listeners on a disorienting, Willy Wonka-like boat ride through a bloody journey of femininity.

Purity Ring, by placing the mature perspective of an adult woman in the throat of an adolescent girl, confer upon children a maturity and sophistication that most don’t possess, and shouldn’t have to. Still, WOMB is some of Purity Ring’s strongest work, a confident and singular statement from a band often imitated over the past decade.

Although WOMB never stops sounding good, the bops came easier in 2012. The best thing you can say about WOMB is that it's an effortful return to form, an album where most tracks slowly but surely prove their worth.

Womb contains a world that is by nature red in tooth and claw, and Purity Ring have found a way to marvel at every single aspect of the experience.

It's more of a steady refinement than a great leap forward. The wait may have been long, but the results are mature and compassionate enough to justify it.

Locked inside Womb is an excellent EP, but stretched out to 10 tracks it can feel predictable. [Jun 2020, p.105]

Despite some stellar production and sparkling pop moments, it feels like there’s been little evolution in the duo’s sound in the five years since ‘Another Eternity’.

There’s very little room for light and shade amongst their wall of cavernous synths, and while this can generate an evocative mood (the bursts of percussion and gloomy electronics of pink lightning does give the impression of thunderstorms) it can sometimes feel like James and Roddick are happy to operate within their comfort zone. Nevertheless, fans of Purity Ring fans will undoubtedly find WOMB to be a welcome return.