I miss Krill. I never knew them personally, I only started to like them a few months before they stopped playing together, and yet I miss Krill.

Their music, like all the best music, makes you feel included–not complicit in action necessarily, but comforted in spirit. And with this week, a week where everyone seems to be experiencing stress and discontent due to elections or research papers or any other third thing, I missed Krill more than ever.

Then I remembered that there was new Krill.

Released this summer almost as an afterthought, “Krill” is composed of only five songs recorded shortly before the band’s break up, and while it offers little in the way of musical progress, it does offer a sense of closure for some of the band’s dangling threads.

For starters, a lot of this closure comes lyrically as many of the songs on “Krill” offer final statements on previous song topics.

Take, for example, “Jubilee.” It deals with the same topic (seasonal depression) as “Brain Problem” from Krill’s previous album “A Distant Fist Unclenching”; however, where “Brain Problem” was more of a confessional story, “Jubilee” shows singer Jonah Furman moving forward, saying “And the winter came and went / my friends were nicer to me / that feeling felt heaven-sent / and I felt so healthy.”

Even though little musical evolution comes through for the band, it is debatable if any was even needed. Krill has always had a remarkable ability to fill in the gaps that other similarly-styled trios leave unfilled with each member bringing something important to the table. Guitarist Aaron Ratoff displays a masterful ability to balance melodic leads with raucous chords while bassist/vocalist Jonah Furman and drummer Ian Becker display an excellent rapport, with the two of them filling in the rhythmic gaps left open by the guitar.

Appropriately enough, the EP ends with one of Krill’s calmest songs, “Billy.” The song meanders along until its outro, dreamily building to a stutter of drums and guitar that crash almost as soon as they crescendo like waves rolling in to the shore. It has all the feeling of a final transmission, and if it is that would be alright. Krill may be gone, but they will surely not be forgotten.