Lip Critic enjoy continually sabotaging any possibility of emotional or sonic stability and their way of transforming chaos into entertainment is proof of this. “Theft World” is a work that screams at you and laughs in your face while you hyperventilate. The story behind the album (a fan who steals the identity of singer Bret Kaser convinced he has discovered hidden messages in the band's music!) already seems like the plot of a fantasy movie. From this absurd situation arises the central mythology of the album. “Theft World” tells us about a paranoid world where everything becomes theft: money, desire, attention, love and spirituality. Nobody owns anything, not even their own identity.
We find ourselves in the presence of a continuous short circuit between digital-hardcore, synth-punk, industrial, breakbeatsrave music, hysterical post-punk and warped rap. Melodic collapses between Death Grips, Korn and Skrillex. However, the album maintains a very clear direction: to overload and overstimulate the brain until anxiety turns into physical euphoria. Opening with “Two Lucks” is a nervous wreck turned into anthem. The drums seem to fight each other, while Bret Kaser spews self-destructive mantras. “Jackpot” balances violence and immediacy with its beat broken and a toxic noise. Under an aesthetic cyberpunk shitpost there is a band that builds precise dynamics, with “Charity Dinner” and “200 Bottles on Eviction” which even show the vulnerable side of the project, almost crossed by a melancholic specter.
At times “Theft World” seems obsessed with the idea of being over the top to the point of sacrificing real depth, as if sonic shocks were more interesting than building real emotional tension (a continuous hyper-stimulation that can even anesthetize). The point of the album, however, lies precisely in wanting to seem like a feeds gone mad, a mind collapsing under the weight of information, desires and fragmented identities. That's why, in this age of music alternative designed for fast consumption on playlist algorithmic, Lip Critics introduce a component of friction that certainly leaves a mark.
06/24/2026
Daniel D`Amico for SANREMO.FM
