Recently, that other long-running music magazine published a list of the 100 Greatest Punk Albums and their picks left me pondering the exact boundaries of punk (which, admittedly, is not a very punk thing to do). Like, if a band’s first album is punk, are they a punk band for life? 

I asked this again while listening to Iceage’s latest album, For Love of Grace & the Hereafter. The band’s debut as teenagers back in 2011 was aggressively punk, so much so it hit No. 59 on that previously mentioned punk albums list. But since then, the band has grown (a good thing, given their early controversies like fascist imagery and selling knives at shows) and now on their sixth record, I’m no longer sure how to classify them. It’s not that they’ve taken a sharp turn into pop or electronica or the like. It’s just that, well, they’ve become more fun.

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The Danish band’s newfound brightness is apparent from the start, as the album opens with twinkling glockespiel. Lead track “Ember” is a strong mission statement, as its driving, angular verses give way to an unexpectedly jangly, sing-along refrain of “I love you in an ominous way.” There’s darkness in those words but also open-hearted passion, and Iceage largely pulls off this balancing act between the two vibes across all of For Love.

Iceage’s music has always carried a “get you on your feet” jolt, but this time they’re ready for the dance floor too. “Match Head Girl” has a flurry of “do do do’s” and cowbell that calls to mind the Rapture, while the swaying beat and sparkling guitar of “Tender Blades” makes for an Arctic Monkeys-esque banger. There is a clear willingness to play around, as “Salve for Every Sore” is a frantic love song sincere enough to incorporate strings, and early single “Star” is their take on a straight-up anthemic rock single. Its drums and emotions build and build to a supernova as frontman Elias B. Rønnenfelt sings “You got me dying like a star.” 

Not that the Danes have lost their edge. Late album pair “Lifetime” and “Holy Water” are as bloody and unrelenting as any song in the band’s history… it’s just that they’re bleak to a beat that I still find myself tapping my foot along to as I type this sentence. There’s also a refreshing sense of empathy for the people going through the pain of their lyrics, particularly on “mother-of-pearl,” the tale of a sex worker who finds herself pregnant. 

Uniting all of these new textures is the incredibly consistent raw energy of Rønnenfelt’s voice and the muscle of Johan S. Weith’s guitar. Their charismatically blunt power is the punk heart underneath every one of these melodic, hummable earworms.

So, in the end, does that mean Iceage is still a punk band? I’m going to cop out and say I don’t care. For Love of Grace & the Hereafter is an electric album that I’ll keep returning to. It shows Iceage has evolved without growing old, and makes a solid case that bands don’t need genre labels.

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