Arcade Fire - Funeral

There was a time Arcade Fire wasn’t popular. This seems like such a hauntingly long time ago. It’s not haunting so much as in it’s spooky but moreso, lingering, their place in music now. I mean, they headlined both Coachella and Austin City Limits last year; forget that, they won the Best Album of the Year Grammy for The Suburbs recently. Sure, it’s arbitrary that last award but it's semi-HUGE for an ‘indie’ band. But there was a time, back in 2004, where they weren’t as massively well-known and adored. Back a time when they were still a modest band with grand impressions and sounds but not so much the audience.

With Funeral they really mastered some of their most magical moments. I remember getting the album in the haze of December 2004 and immediately hooking into the bookends. It starts with a frenzied attack of melody, guitar, driving drums and Win Butler’s amazing vocals. I remember first hearing this song and feeling a wave of emotions run through me while the song continued to swell into an incredible rush of sounds. I must’ve played this song the most out of any other song, I fell in love with it upon first listen and now, it might be my favorite song by them. There’s big crashing cymbals, spectral synthesizer and pulling keyboards on top of rolling drums and guitars - it was an exceptional way to start an album and a lot of what really made Funeral so special was the downright flawless sequencing, beginning with “Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels).”


With “In the Backseat,” there’s a song that ends with a beautiful female vocal in Régine Chassagne. I love the way it’s about passing around in the backseat where you don’t have to worry about a thing in the world. You can simply enjoy the view, you don’t have to even speak, you don’t have to concentrate, and you can simply forget it all. The metaphors run wild with everything from life passing you by, to finding a comforting love where you can simply bask in their nurturing care and escape from the wrath of the real world – it’s all up for interpretation. What I do know is the way the music quietly and subtly grows before the drums explode is sheer genius: there are both passing waves before the clash of water comes, revealing her voice to the backdrop of flourishing strings and wind instruments. "I’ve been learning to drive my whole life," she belts at the end: I’ve been trying to just find a way to conquer it all, let me relax. It’s a remarkable calling and with music that pairs it so justly, so fairly – like a perfect blend of musical expression and emotion – there wouldn’t be another way to end Funeral.

I’m lame for barely mentioning this album now but it’s been a terribly challenging day (emphasis on the terrible!) and I got to blast it through my headphones just right now. It’s sort of nostalgic in a sense that I really wrapped my head around it enough to let it live with me for years and years. This is a tremendous band and many, I’m not sure if I’m included, consider this their best album. Surely I wont leave the entire middle eight songs go unmentioned; I hope to write more on it soon. Until then. – Bryan

Arcade Fire – Neon Bible

There was a brief period of time where one probably thought Arcade Fire couldn’t possibly match Funeral ever again. I mean, even I remember listening to this album and wondering if it was too angry, too angst-filled, too bitter? And obviously, back then, that was many people just over-thinking such amazing music way too early. A few years later, after making one of the best albums of 2010, Neon Bible is definitely, a magnificent album on its own.

I still remember listening to these crashing, pounding waves through my speakers in my small studio. I always think of the huge atmospherics on “Black Mirror” as the sound of the ocean beating against a heavy wind as everything comes pouring down. The song’s atmospherics are definitely significant but the keyboard’s repetitive pound, Win Butler’s soaring singing and the ending strings’ explosion is for sure, HUGE, too. There was always a certain beauty to it and I love the way it introduces the album in a dark and booming way. I probably played it over 100 times in 2007, and many times over and over and even still now, it’s worth it every time.


When it comes to closers, like Arctic Monkeys and few others, Arcade Fire are masters of them. Speaking about Funeral, that album’s closer is majestically gorgeous and even the proper ending on The Suburbs is an interpolation of that opener’s melody with poignant, lasting words; in short, both are awesome. Well for Neon Bible, they bellow with a traditional organ that shifts through heavy pedal tones and the pounding of a soft drum before everything explodes around the 2:10 mark. The production of a big open space allows the organ to reign throughout and while the thump is always the focus, the pure largeness of the ending overtakes you, like a massive wave. It’s hard to say really, but maybe this is their best closer? – Bryan

Arcade Fire – The Suburbs (Final August Edition…pt. 4)

I figured it be a great way to close the month and ring in the new one with another few lame talks on The Suburbs. Now, don’t get me wrong, the writing by me might be lame but the music is anything but, I promise. I could probably still hear it 100 times straight and I’d still hold it close and dear to me. It’s still the album I love with all of my heart and it hasn’t grown weary yet. I know, I’m lame but here are a few thoughts on two more amazing songs. (For the last time? Maybe, maybe not.)

The second half light feature follows a pretty heavy expectation: being just as good as your predecessor. And though the first half light is definitely one of the album’s many memorable moments, like the other second-parts on the other suites, it’s a livelier, more upbeat feel. Here the vocals are shared between a lower register for the female and the lead on top singing about how “Some people say we’ve already lost but they’re afraid to pay the cost.” There’s growth and expansion throughout the song, with the addition of more thumping drum machine, more tapping drum set, more syncopated cymbals and an impressive lead into the ensuing battle…


I heard “Suburban War” for the first time when I was in the shower and I couldn’t believe that it was actually happening. It was a Monday and I was in the middle of it all when I heard the explosion and the ensuing chaos. Naturally, through a few walls and shower-head, it was a bit muffled but my immediate reaction was, “Oh wow, what just happened?” This was way before I knew that the war had already been foreshadowed on the first song, how the same line about “grabbing your mom’s keys because ‘we’re leaving’” would be repeated and how in the end, “The music divides us into tribes. You choose your side…I’ll choose my side.” I love the simplicity of it and how everything can change in an instance, forever. It’s definitely when it first hit me that this was a special album – nothing’s changed since that day. – Bryan

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs (Pt. 3)

One of the very first things that really sucked me in to this album was its diversity. I don’t think that any of the songs sound like any of the other songs on the album – I hope that makes sense. But on a song by song level, they all sound so dissimilar from each other and yet, they paint this cohesively illustrious picture. Here's a couple more to check out. (if anyone is actually listening to this stuff, please let me know.)

This one is “Modern Man,” which is, essentially, about living in a world where everything is losing meaning, where nothing seems to make sense and where you just kind of sit there, stagnant, against the current. He sings about breaking the mirror and changing the cycle and how it all “Makes me [him] feel like, like something don't feel right.” The connections are everywhere, with the best lines coming when he’s offering the youngsters advice: “Maybe when you're older you will understand why you don't feel right…why you can't sleep at night now.”


I made a copy of this album for my mom and she’s been avidly listening to it. She’s even called me a few different times while in her car and I hear various different moments playing in the background. She mentioned a song about living in a city with no children and then said, “But the one after it, the one with that awesome sound in the beginning? Well, I love that one so much.” For me, it’s even something that she can listen to it but love a song off it? Here is that song, “Half Light I,” singing about “hiding the ocean in a shell,” and I won’t ruin it by saying too much, expect that it’s absolutely gorgeous: - Bryan

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs (Again)

I love how this album has been able to grab my attention and keep it firmly held; and yet, in retrospect, I’ve held it close to my heart the entire time as well. It’s the first album since 2007 (tell you all about that album later) that I’ve fallen head over heels for and although I’ve battled against it with some other awesome stuff (I mean, come on, that Janelle Monáe video?) and still, it’s the one I come back to, every single time. So before you know it – and let me apologize beforehand – but I just might post about every single song when all is said is done.

Here is “Sprawl I (Flatland)”, a song that is devoted entirely to opening a broken teenager’s heart only to find a desolate soul. The song is the bridge between what might be the album’s smoothest transitions and at less than three minutes long, it lulls you into its darkness with fantastic results. Imagery is key here: the messages about driving endlessly into the sprawl, living on the buried nostalgia that should stay, well, buried, the darkness that contrasts against the lights in the reflectors, and recalling old memories with bitter distaste. My favorite part, easily, is where he admits that he finally has something of his own, something to give and then still ask what the point of it all really is:


One thing I wanted to really point out was how beautiful the band actually sounds on the album. For starters, it’s a huge band with various members and Owen Pallett even shows up to lend strings on here. At the core is Win Butler and Régine Chassagne’s vocals and how they always melt into each other; so much so, that even when they switch things up (when going from the aforementioned song into the previously posted about second part of the sprawl) it still sounds impeccably cohesive.

And so, I imagine the only logical step was to post the opener, the one that kicks it all of. Butler described the album as “a mix of Depeche Mode and Neil Young” and those influences are definitely all over The Suburbs. A lot of it reminds me of what Dylan sounded like when he was recording music for Wonder Boys but this song is the epitome of what this gorgeous album is made of. Check out the somber lyrics about trying to understand why someone would want a daughter at a young age and how it hit homes, harder, for some.
- Bryan

Arcade Fire – The Suburbs

I wasn’t expecting something like this, I really wasn’t. And trust me, I know that it's’ super lame of me to be discussing an album that is probably already starting to hit overdrive but come on, this is just too good. I was in a ‘love at first then hate afterwards’ kind of relationship with Arcade Fire and when Neon Bible came out, I was definitely feeling good about their music. It took me a good two years after that to finally come around to Funeral, again, and now, there’s The Suburbs.

For starters, it’s spectacular. It’s an album that latches on to you and pulls you around its every corner. And for me, it was something that hit me like no other, and I wasn’t even expecting it. Their sounds are much more diverse on this album, some would call it sprawling and yet, they still sound personally identifiable. Some stuff revels in the Springsteen stuff of the past, other stuff is like the best of U2 and R.E.M.; they’re like Talking Heads in the way everyone contributes (female and male vocals, string instruments, synths) and like the great music of the 80s and 90s meshed together.

Here is “Rococo” which will surely melt your heart away. The pace is subdued and the focus lies on the harmonies and the vocals singing the chorus together. The enunciation is the best but it all stunningly hits you:


“Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)” is like Blondie of the 80s, with her synths dancing around her. The female vocals take over and you get a penultimate song that leaves you in awe. It’s like your looking over the hill on to better things and seeing the sun burst through is given you some peace of mind. It’s a heavenly good sound and a beautiful way to close it all out. Check it here:


-Bryan