The Twilight Sad are engaged in a balancing act. To their left lies a tendency to err on the side of simplicity of sound and sentiment; to their right lies an exaggerated willingness to try out complex soundscapes and challenging rhythmic transitions. One feels that if they could only get to the other side, their dark rock would be lasting and listenable.

As it is, they go too far in both directions, yielding a monotonous record that suggests the empty, affected emotion of Placebo, the synthetic strings of The Cure, the rhythmic playfulness of recent Radiohead and the dumb-but-sincere masculinity of the likes of Linkin Park.

The album has nine songs and a ‘bonus track’ whose most striking common denominator is a frustrating unwillingness to let the songs get their bearings: rather than bringing choruses and hooks to their logical conclusions, they are interrupted in midstream to give way to new rhythmic and melodic layers. In the otherwise promising tracks ‘Don’t Move’ and ‘Nil,’ for instance, a strong bass line, vocals uncompromised by James Graham’s propensity to yodel and interesting drumming are not enough to counter the constant barrage of distractingly shifting rhythmic patterns and melodies.

In spite of these melodic interruptions, the instrumental sound of the record remains uniform to a fault. From beginning to end we are offered an insistently ‘industrial’-like sonic landscape inhabited by convincing (but all too transient) bass riffs, ominous clanging noises, artificial string arrangements and Mr Graham’s occasionally haunting but often overwrought vocal.

‘Another Bed’—which should bring fresh hope to all who have dreamt of a synthesis of disco and darkness—illustrates the limitations of opting for such a monotonous sound: it is doubly disappointing in its failure to work as a stand-alone track and fit into the architecture of the album.

Overall, while No One Can Ever Know is certainly not without qualities to recommend it, it is an album whose strengths are plagued by corresponding weaknesses.