Brooklyn quartet Big Ups have been referred as a post-hardcore band, an umbrella term meant to tell us that that they blend the pummel of straight-up hardcore with tension and seemingly bucolic moments. While this was a fair description of their discordant and vicious 2014 debut, Eighteen Hours of Static, each note feeling like it was being forced ruthlessly into the mosh pit typical at most Big Ups shows, it is even more accurate for their sophomore record Before a Million Universes. While these lapses into chaos are still very much present, Big Ups place a greater emphasis on quiet moments, on gradual buildups, which of course then allow the instrumental fits of Brendan Finn (drums), Amar Lal (guitar), and Carlos Salguero (bass) to feel even more explosive by contrast. Every phrase Galarraga screams, every phrase that he does not, every burst of noise within a track’s connective fiber are carefully calculated tabs on their audience’s emotional pulse.
Eighteen Hours of Static spent a lot of time deep in the thick of things, questioning and distrusting society with relentless fury ("Everybody says it’s getting better all the time / But it’s bad still bad"). Before a Million Universes focuses on "dissecting" their problems, as singer Joe Galarraga explained in an interview. Accordingly, they spend less time directly confronting bureaucratic bullshit (One glaring exception is the seething "Capitalized" with its sardonic query, "Tell me what you’re worth/Salary, two weeks off from work?/Call them benefits and perks") and instead focus on how the macrocosm affects the individual. "Why live in the moment/If the moment is broken? There could be hope for someone/If we fix it," Galarraga asks on "Hope for Someone."
Their political ideologies, meanwhile, have simmered below the surface of the music, expressing themselves in the song’s unpredictable dynamics. "Meet Where We Are" is largely muted, growing a little more manic for each repetition of the title and only releasing the tension at the end with an electric jolt. "Negative"’s moments of peace are designated for its brief intro before the chaos rolls in via sharp, punctuated shouts and rolling guitar s. "So Much You" hits hardest with its simplicity, its sullen comment that "I haven’t been with myself at all." None of these songs would have the same effect if rushed, which is what set Big Ups apart from many of their peers.
Before a Million Universes borrows its title from section 48 of Walt Whitman’s "Song of Myself" from Leaves of Grass: "And I say to any man or woman, Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes." Although the quote is never spoken verbatim on the record, Big Ups clearly understand their place within the cosmos. When their time to stand before a million universes arrives, they will approach the unknown with confidence and calmness, like the shadowy figure in Caspar David Friedrich’s "Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog."
Nowhere is this so apparent than on "National Parks," which lies unobtrusively in the later half of the record and is perhaps the standout track. The song is a meditation on the financial difficulties faced by a woman metaphorically meant to reflect Galarraga’s own upbringing. The song concludes with the subject and narrator traveling together: "We got on a plane and flew across the country/And saw the biggest trees /Bigger than the ones that lined her streets/Bigger than she'd ever seen/Bigger than one could think to exist/I think I saw her say to herself-/"This is everything I've missed." It is in this moment, with an aerial perspective of the vast world, that Big Ups open themselves to a million universes and accept the sublime.
