Arcade Fire review

EDIT: Dixie press has moved, and the link is broken. Posting the review here.

Put down the neon bible, exit the funeral, and head to the suburbs

While the music industry struggles to come up with a reason why other artists are selling 10 albums per week, Canadian indie rock septet Arcade Fire stick to what works: making great music. This extraordinary entry into their catalog is entitled The Suburbs. Fans are bound to be delighted, but new listeners may want to pack a lunch; this album runs 64 minutes across 16 tracks.

Arcade Fire became the poster children of indie rock a couple of years ago, so naturally this listener dismissed them as a band with little substance and a lot of hype. After a cursory listen to their previous albums Funeral and Neon Bible, Suburbs went into the player. What this listener found was plenty of substance and a new band to put into the daily rotation.

Suburbs can be characterized many ways, and some of the words to describe the album are as follows: intricate, subtle, surprising, complex, moody, catchy and straightforward. These traits are mixed into the album in perfect proportion and topped off with themes of emptiness, love, insecurity, and movement from youth to maturity. The end product is an album that is fine tuned, sprawling, and anthemic without becoming pretentious.

Arcade Fire proves with this release that they’re no one trick pony, and that’s apparent from the diversity in the tracks presented on Suburbs. From simple, relaxed acoustic guitar tracks “The Suburbs”, “Wasted Hours”, to tracks with strings or synthesizers at the forefront “Empty Room”, “Half Light II”, to straightforward indie rock “Month of May”, Suburbs is varied enough to never get boring.

Husband and wife duo Win Butler and Regine Chassagne share vocal duties throughout the album. Butler seems confident with his parts, but Chassagne is excellent. Sadly, she is underutilized throughout, giving mostly backing vocals except on “Empty Room” and “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)”.

String arrangements and synthesizers/keys are represented on most tracks, but are so well placed in the background on some tracks that listeners may not even realize that they’re hearing these parts until they listen to the album multiple times.

The production by Markus Dravs (Coldplay’s Viva La Vida, Bjork’s Homogenic) is great, and not a note seems out of place. Standout tracks are: “Ready to Start”, “Modern Man”, “Suburban War”, “Month of May”, “We Used to Wait”, and “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)”. While the whole album is grand, new listeners may want to start with the suggested tracks first before listening to the album as a whole.

Last, but certainly not least, is the album art. This listener is a total CD nerd, having to buy a physical copy of everything, and was impressed with the art. The album cover, interior and lyric sheet have snapshots of suburban homes that coincide well with the themes and imagery of the lyrics.

To say that this listener was impressed with the album would be an understatement. Fans of the band and new listeners alike should purchase this record. Rest assured, The Suburbs will be visited often.

LP

Music Review

EDIT: After the Dixie press' website crashed my review disappeared. I'll be running it here until they put it back up. Here we go....

When it comes to fun summer jams listeners might want to go with something familiar.

Rufio has been a staple of the pop-punk genre since 2001, but how does their latest release, “anybody out there?” rate against the rest of their catalog?

The answer is pretty well, as long as listeners aren’t expecting any form of evolution from the band. Rufio’s brand of pop punk follows the fast guitars and catchy-as-can -be route and doesn’t stray much from it. This has been the case since their 2001 debut “perhaps, I suppose…” and is by no means a bad thing. That is not to say that the band hasn’t improved some elements of this tried and true formula with this release, because they have.

After the departure of two of the founding members of the band and a lengthy hiatus, a significant portion of Rufio’s fanbase may be slightly anxious to see where the band would go with this release, and listeners should not be entirely disappointed. The band has returned with a solid album that any fan of pop-punk should enjoy.

Scott Sellers’ vocals have also improved abundantly on this album. This should prove to listeners that musically and vocally, Rufio have come back to the scene in top form.

This is glaringly evident on such standout tracks like “Under 18,” “Gold and silver” and “What you wanna here.” These tracks are the epitome of great summer music, but that’s not to say that the album doesn’t have its weaknesses as well.

While the pop-punk genre has evolved over the course of the last decade, Rufio’s style has largely stayed the same. This can be viewed as a detriment to the band, just because so many great alternatives exist now.

After a couple of listens to the album, there was a lingering feeling that the band should have switched things up and taken some risks with this release. Also, the band is still hurting in the lyrical department. Some lyrical missteps can be overlooked, but with choruses like: “get out of my little world/you’ve got no right to stay” Rufio don’t seem to be at the height of the lyrical game here. After nine years of being in the scene, listeners may be wondering why these guys wouldn’t have something a little more eloquent to say.

These are the major complaints that the record, but in all honesty; this album wasn’t meant to be some artistic band’s swansong, it was meant to be fun.

This album comes recommended to anyone looking for a fun, summer listen, but don’t be surprised if the fun doesn’t last until winter.

Hope you enjoy. There will be another review up soon.

LP