There’s no point in arguing the matter: Relationship of Command is the best At the Drive-In record, and At the Drive-In was one of the absolute best of the punk/emo/hardcore scene of the late nineties/early oughts, if not the outright best.

Cedric Bixler’s words were as cryptic as they were long (“A vivid dissection that mocked the strut of vivisection”? Okay, dude). Omar’s guitar weaves like a serpent through Jim Ward’s heavy riffs, threatening to burst out of his speaker cabinet. Paul Hinojos’ bass tears along the bottom edge or bounces up the register effortlessly, while Tony Hajjar beats the drums into a frenzy to match. And on this record, their powers combine like never before, creating some of the most exciting music the Warped Tour crowd had ever heard.

But it’s not just fury–some of the best moments occur when the band cool things off and let the music play itself–Invalid Litter Dept.* is an obvious example, but Quarantined is a forgotten gem. Buried toward the end of the record, after all of the singles and Iggy Pop cameos have come and gone, Quarantined rolls along with the power of voodoo, calling on the spirit of dub reggae between its heavier segments. Non-Zero Possibility rides like a track buried at the end of OK Computer, thick with creeping paranoia and heavy, plodding chords.

Thirteen years later, after splits and reunions and reissues, this album still packs as much of a punch as it did the first time I heard it. The drum fill and “HEY!” into Pattern Against User and Cedric’s sputtering delivery in Sleepwalk Capsules pump just as much adrenaline. Enfilades is still as paranoid and creepy as it was the first time I heard the ransom message and melodica solo in the middle. Even Catacombs, the reissue bonus track tacked onto the end, complements the running order (even if it’s not quite as good as the rest of the record, but that’s a high order). But after six Mars Volta records (and a NEW Cedric Omar band now? Sheesh) and three records from (the far inferior) Sparta, it’s good to revisit a time when the two factions of ATDI formed one, monstrous whole.

*I first discovered At The Drive-In after downloading a Dashboard Confessional song called “Dancing on the Corpse’s Ashes” on Bearshare and discovering that it was 1. not Dashboard Confessional and 2. much better than Dashboard Confessional