People are always saying that the world is going to end, but until now they might have had trouble picking the proper sound track for its promised demise.
Luckily for them, M83 just released his latest album, Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, and there are few albums better suited to soundtrack the end of the world—exciting, terrifying, sad, ecstatic, quiet, bombastic, the works. Luckily for M83 fans, the people who keep saying the world is going to end appear to be crazy, so there is plenty of time to listen to the new album.
M83’s Anthony Gonzalez has become a synthesizer reverend of sorts and he is completely and wholly committed to whatever he is preaching. Every little thing matters—from the cosmic to the magic frogs—and it all matters a lot.
He yells to high heaven, tender but impassioned. He forms huge choruses of his own voice as if we are witnessing melodic arguments he is having with multiple consciences. He out yodels Zola Jesus. Vocals echo and linger, reproduced voices float through the air—he has the audacity to immerse you in a world entirely of his own, but he believes in it just enough that maybe he pulls it off. At times he acquires Phil Spectorish levels of grandiosity, and while it may not be the wall of sound, some of it may make you want to run through walls. By sheer force of will, even slower acoustic numbers like “Wait” sound like an atom bomb.
“Midnight City” was a superlative single, and M83 reaches that peak again with several songs on the album itself. The squawky church funk of “Claudia Lewis” and the clanging guitars of “New Map” are impressive. “Steve Mcqueen” is totally overwhelming, combining call and response vocals, pounding drums, and sizzling keyboard and guitar riffs that all crescendo over a synthetic sheen. Its almost upsetting how many powerful, anthemic chord progressions Gonzalez packed into that song, and yet it remains lithe, never collapses under its own weight, magically rolls forward, and carries you with it.
Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming can be overly cute at times, and occasionally Gonzalez sounds like he’s in a constant game of one-upmanship with himself, but if you liked, loved, or worshipped early single “Midnight City,” you’ll want this album.
M83 plays two sold out shows at The Black Cat on 10/28 and if you’re in DC I’d recommend selling your soul to attain a ticket somehow—if the new album is any indication, there will likely be little left of the place by Saturday morning. It won’t quite be the end of the world, but it’ll be a worthy approximation of it.
Enter in the comments to win our vinyl copy of Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming by letting us know what you’d be spinning as the soundtrack to the world’s destruction—outside of M83’s latest, of course. We’ll give you a week and choose our winner with a US or North American mailing address on 10/25!
