When AFI began their fourth studio album, Black Sails In The Sunset, with the memorable gang vocals of “Through our bleeding, we are one!” they lit the match for one of the most explosive band trajectories ever witnessed in this scene. This would be the first LP with the now-classic lineup of Jade Puget, Adam Carson, Hunter Burgan, and Davey Havok, and featured a dramatic shift away from the punk rock sound they had explored on their earlier work in favor of a darker-tinged aesthetic. Black Sails In The Sunset is one of those gripping albums that grab the listener by the throat from the very first spin and beckons them to join in the fray. While AFI certainly weren’t the only punk band to explore a darker side to the sound, they did seem to do it a bit more flawlessly than the bands that would later emulate their career path.
This album has recently received a fresh vinyl reissue via Craft Recordings, that releases on July 19, 2024, and it includes several additional bonus tracks like “Midnight Sun,” “Who Knew?”, “Weight Of Words” and the previously vinyl-only song of “Lower It” has been added to the tail end of the tracklisting (rather than closing out Side A, as found on previous vinyl versions). AFI have re-captured our collective imaginations on this thrilling, comprehensive reissue that hits just as hard as it did back in the early summer of 1999.
After the opening song of “Strength Through Wounding,” AFI waste little time getting into the business at hand with a blast of punk rock energy found on “Porphyria,” that features the refrain of, “In darkness together, we’re bringing the light / In darkness together, we are forming / The fire tomorrow is born of the night / In darkness together we ignite.” What AFI were doing here was paying a quick homage to their past style, while still blazing a clear path ahead in their own artistic discovery. The band rarely lets up on the gas pedal with punishing songs like “Exsanguination” and “Malleus Maleficarum.” On the latter song in particular, AFI would hint to where they would take the exploration of autumn on Sing The Sorrow with the closing lyrics of “We all begin to burn / Autumn’s flame dances in my eyes / Set alight for all we’ve learned / My ashes falling, can you feel me?” The beats by drummer Adam Carson were spectacularly on point and filled with purpose throughout this memorable song.
”Narrative Of Soul Against Soul” continued down the path of a more brooding type of punk rock energy, while “Clove Smoke Catharsis” was a rare mid-tempo track that found AFI fully embracing the darkness in a metal-tinged song that featured heavy riffs from Jade Puget paired with Havok’s trademark vocal wail. My personal favorite song on the record is “The Prayer Position” since it was one of the more memorable tracks I heard when I witnessed AFI for the first time live at the 9:30 Club in Washington, DC, and it prominently features heavy verses paired with a pop-driven refrain of “And in the distance there’s a gathering / That no longer seems so far away.” AFI would fully lean into this pop realm on Sing the Sorrow’s “Dancing Through Sunday,” but this aforementioned song is a great one to point to this discovery in their sound.
”The Last Kiss” hops along with a rock n’ roll passion that should’ve made Guns N’ Roses proud, and the bridge features a really unique-sounding guitar solo from Jade Puget that almost hints to some of the electronica that AFI would put in their later albums. The bass-heavy “Weathered Tome” put the band’s great chemistry on full display, while “At A Glance” showcased that the band could fire on all cylinders for a full album’s duration with ease.
Everything quickly builds to the first true ballad AFI had written to date in the classic, “God Called In Sick Yesterday.” From the cautious opening riff from Puget, to Havok’s restrained clean vocals in the verses, the song continues to gather steady momentum before exiting into the darkness of the final lyrics of, “I can’t stand my laughter as they cry / My soul brings tears to angelic eyes / And miles away my mother cries / Omnipotence nurturing malevolence.”
As far as the bonus tracks in this set, “Who Knew?” is a nice gem to round out the direction AFI were going for on Black Sails In The Sunset, and the song only previously appeared on the Japanese version of the disc. Additionally, “Weight Of Words” sounds like a cool exploratory song that AFI may have only been messing around with as a rough idea before cleaning up for this reissue. It’s still pretty great to hear all of this era on a single LP, and I applaud the effort by Craft Recordings to make sure this anniversary package would be something longtime fans would treasure for years to come.