Music is very tied to memory for me. Records dot my memories like snapshots of specific times and places. However, since I do most of my listening through physical media—which costs money—I can’t memorialize all of those snapshots. Invariably, some of the stuff I’m listening to at any given point ends up slipping through the cracks of my limited record budget.

But occasionally, a forgotten record will rear its head years after the fact. In this case, that record is Silent Shout by Swedish brother-sister duo The Knife, a record that was included in the deluge of new music I was exposed to by my roommates in Chicago. While I loved the record from first listen, it was crowded out of my to-buy list by bands like Neutral Milk Hotel, Kraftwerk, New Order, Deerhunter, Grizzly Bear, and so much more.

Then this past year, my dear friend Bryan ordered me a copy for my birthday, rectifying its absence on my shelf.

That period of my life was too overwhelming for The Knife to stand out as much as they should have. I had a very tenuous understanding of the scenes and trends and archetypes they were trading in. But after fifteen years of deeper study into the history of pop music and its various subgenres, I have a much better appreciation for it.

In the mid 00’s that birthed this record, synthpop was still largely dismissed by the hipster set. Lady Gaga hadn’t brought Art House to the Top 40 yet, and IDM pioneers like Autechre and Aphex Twin were bubbling around the fringes of mainstream awareness, and even that was primarily filtered through Radiohead. Most “serious” bands that were appropriating pop music’s conventions were eschewing its sensibilities. Vocals were rare. Hooks were even rarer.

And while The Knife had way more in common with IDM acts than mainstream pop, they fully embraced the tropes of the latter. Though their vocals are perpetually warped by pitch shifting and modulation effects, there’s no denying the pop sensibilities. These songs are catchy as hell, even when the vocals sound like they emanate from a robot or alien or dark spiritual force.

This record might have failed to make much of an impact on the music charts at the time, still relegated to the fringes of IDM and underground electronica, it sounds years ahead of its time. Perhaps the biggest proof of this is the success of Karin Dreijer as Fever Ray, who has become a fixture of red carpet events in their own right. But while most people might think of The Knife as Fever Ray’s old band, to me Fever Ray will always be remembered as half of The Knife.