Arcade Fire - Everything Now

Everything Now
Arcade Fire
Tiger Rating: 4.5 / 10
Indie Disco?

What should have been a spectacular surprise album unfortunately turns out to be a mediocre effort at best, failing to achieve the genius it was aiming for.

It's been a good four years since we've heard anything from our favourite Canadian exports (sorry Celine), and, trendsetters that they are, they have kept suspiciously silent, waiting to do a Beyonce with their latest album. Then began the guerilla marketing campaign - anagrams on Twitter and weird merchandising. Their efforts were creative and exhausting and ultimately just silly. What should have been a spectacular surprise at the end of all the clues (and judging from it's lead single, it would have been), unfortunately turns out to be a half cocked album with mostly weak songs, a few utterly spectacular ones and some filler tracks that fail to help the album achieve the genius it was aiming for.


I genuinely love this band, so instead of writing a six paragraph stink piece on how much they suck now, I'm just going to give the album a play by play to illustrate what I mean.

Here we go.

1/ Everything_Now (Continued)

The theme and concept for this album, according to verbose frontman Win Butler, came from an overheard conversation about long running TV show 'The Sopranos'. In it, a girl was telling her friend about coming to the end of a binge viewing session and being disappointed, but wanting to find something new to watch.
"This was maybe six years ago... and it just hit me that this thing that took ten years to make someone watched in a weekend and was annoyed there wasn’t more. I was like whoa; I feel like culturally the moment and this kind of era that we’ve entered into of kind of everything-nowness has positive and negative sides to it but it’s definitely a new way of being"
It's a compelling enough idea, and might have been able to drive this album, but as it is we have this pretty empty intro that leads into:

2/ Everything Now
The single that shimmied in from nowhere, landing like a sequined alien in the landscape of the singles chart, vying for domination on dancefloors. 'Everything Now' is possibly destined to be the bands most successful single of their career. The Abba keys, the soaring chorus, the African flute, the 'Nah nah nah' breakdown - this out-of-nowhere song is undeniably catchy. Until it becomes annoying. As with the rest of the album, there is a dippet of inspiration here that is relentlessly but inexpertly mined, drawing out no fewer than 36 repetitions of "everything now". Catchy but repetitive af.

3/ Signs Of Life
The bassline and handclaps intro, which is followed by a Debbie Harry-esque rap, seem to confirm suspicions that this album is looking backwards for inspiration. By the time the bongos kick in towards the chorus, you're sure of it. Dark electric disco is cool. Singing the days of the week and another endlessly repeated chorus, not so much. There is a very vague nod to Michael Jackson's 'Thriller', with the subtlest of chord changes in the final few bars, which is cool. It takes genius to subtly pay homage to an inspiration and do it well. This one doesn't.

4/ Creature Comfort
Ok I'm just going to say it. This is one of the, if not the, best single Arcade Fire have ever released. It's catchy, clever, relevant, is vulnerable and aloof at the same time, and has that effortless, self referencing cool that band has always embodied. And that twitchy synth! It just gets under your skin and drives you crazy. I'm not getting sick of this one any time soon. When Regine shrieks "On and on I dunno what I want" like a crazed disco banshee, I find myself singing along every time. This track is undeniable.

5/ Peter Pan
"Be my Wendy I'll be your Peter Pan". Em. OK. I'm just not entirely convinced that Butler can pull off a lot of these lyrics. As a band they're just too self aware here. The vibe of the track itself is alright. It's a near quasi ska feel, which is something they flirted with on Reflektor. The return of the manic flutes over the near-dub beat is great but only lasts for one bar.
I feel that only on the title track is their experimentation realised in an acceptable way. Otherwise there is a failure to really commit to any one of the vibes (maybe in the interest of making a coherent album).

6/ Chemistry
Yet another half realised concept for a song, resulting in a tedious, endlessly repetitive chorus. That bass again though. I kind of wish there was a dub version of this album. For the first time their songwriting and lyrics just aren't at all up to scratch. This track should've ended at the 2.55 minute mark. Awful. Genuinely.

7/ Infinite Content
Parallels to LCD Soundsystem are thinly disguised on this album. The band is longtime friends with Murphy, so it shouldn't be surprising that there are flavours of and nods in the direction of his band. But where LCD could drop a little punk track that actually beefed up an album, AF's attempt falls slightly flat.

8/ Infinite_Content
Insubstantial_content.

9/ Electric Blue
It feels like this entire album was built around three great singles. I love it when Regine takes centre stage. 'It's Never Over', 'Sprawl II' and 'Haiti' are all bangers and this one is no different. It's laid back but has a steady groove and reeks of suntan lotion and salty air. Or maybe its a soundtrack for a late night in the town after a day on the beach. It's great.

10/ Good God Damn
Another attempt from Butler at being a slinky, sleezy, wizened narrator of modern culture. When he's often played near the border of self parody (as all good hipster icons should), on this album he loses the balance and falls into the error of actually being a parody of himself. There's ultimately just not enough realised depth in the lyrics here. Nearly every track is hinged on an idea or a word play, with them not actually exploring anything fully. Unfortunately this just amounts to weak songwriting. Something they've never been guilty of before.

11/ Put Your Money On Me
"Chloroform sky, clouds made of Ambien, sitting on the carpet of heaven". Win has always been fascinated by the afterlife and the idea of a higher power (often scoffing at It), but it's when he's in this sultry, pondering mode that he actually makes some of his more profound observations. The random blips from the arcade synth that punctuate the chorus and the 'Stranger Things' kind of bassline that gently propels this moody track forward are the highlights here.
A for Acceptable.

12/ We Don't Deserve Love
And here again we have one of the best tracks the band has ever done. It's as subtle as a gossamer strand and ultimately plays out like a delicate electric country track. When the chorus kicks in unexpectedly at the 2.23 minute mark, it's a truly delightful surprise. There is the masterful hand at work here - the one the band displayed on their first album all those years ago, where they hold an idea lightly but present their musings on it with clarity. Every individual element of this track hangs together so well and it's perfectly placed.

13/ Everything Now (Continued)
A well placed reprise will reveal the real genius of an album - see Lorde's 'Liability (Reprise)' on her recent album or Blood Orange's 'Time Will Tell' on 'Cupid'. A good refrain can bring us back to a point of feeling something again; it can bring us back around to a thought from a deeper or higher perspective, and ultimately make us feel that we've gone on a journey with the artists and gained some needed insight or grown a little in the space of a few songs.
This refrain / outro (which is meant to fit together with the intro - tempo and all) serves up no new emotional content and thus serves only for yet more repitition.



AF have attempted to serve up another album of genius proportions; a narrative of modern culture's obsession with consumerism, with all the dark humour and sardonic slants that they've been known for over the years. Unfortunately it all just falls flat and winds up being one of the flimsiest efforts of their career. Their reticence to attack any genre full throttle, combined with their self awareness that has become more of a shrinking self consciousness covered up with sequins and bravado, makes for an ultimately disappointing listen. I'd rather not take everything_now and just keep the few truly excellent tracks that are on this album. And no, the title track is not one of them.

WVS