I love Arcade Fire. I love the snarky eclecticism of ‘Funeral’, I like the darkness of ‘Neon Bible’, the sentimentality of ‘The Suburbs’, and even the weird dissention of ‘Reflektor’. ‘Everything Now’ is, for the most part, unlike anything they’ve done before. Tell a lie, it’s more of an amped-up version of their more danceable moments, their more new wave moments, their more synth-driven moments. It’s a midnight drive into a bright, fluorescent, champagne glass, disco ball, city light, glittery, flashy happening pad, and it sucks.
Oh boy, where to start? I have to admit, I don’t find that much of ‘Everything Now’ to actually be atrocious, it’s more an accumulation of misadventures, just mediocre idea-making. Maybe Arcade Fire are running out of ideas, which is funny because there’s a song on this album called ‘Infinite Content’, actually there are two songs on this album called ‘Infinite Content’, but that’s masked by the fact that there are three songs called ‘Everything Now’. I didn’t have high hopes going into the album, seeing how divisive a bunch of the tracks released before the album were, even more so than the majority of ‘Reflektor’, and it’s that way for a reason, or maybe multiple reasons.
The album’s title track is disco-lite, which should be more uplifting than it is as it comes after the infuriatingly pessimistic short opener (‘Everything Now (Continued)’). Instead, it just feels like easy listening, like, disco for old people, or dads who don’t have any taste. A lot of the album comes across this way, but slightly better on some tracks. ‘Creature Comfort’ would be pleasant, it would actually be a great Arcade Fire single if it wasn’t for Regine’s shrill backing vocals. It’s a shame because I really dig the track’s juxtaposition of deceptively negative lyrics with optimistic-sounding instrumentals.
‘Electric Blue’ is the song that does the best job of achieving the ‘Sprawl II Part Two’ thing that the album seems to be going for. Still, I much prefer Regine’s vocals on ‘Sprawl II’, because on this song, she goes really weirdly high, producing some of the most ill-advised falsetto I’ve heard recently. And that’s a shame because it’s probably my favourite song on the album otherwise, I just wish Regine had a bit more awareness as far as her voice is concerned. It captures the same ‘Heart of Glass’ new wave appeal that ‘Sprawl II’ and a couple of other songs from ‘The Suburbs’ had, and I really like that – nice synths, nice chords.
As long as we’re still talking about the stylistics of the album, let’s talk about ‘Chemistry’. Holy shit, what a bad song. I don’t really believe that cultural appropriation exists to the extent that people seem to say, but I’ve never heard a vintage reggae/ska backing section sound so out of place on an album. The old-fashioned horns swoop in straight away, and at that point you know you’re in for a bad time, because the song just feels tacky as hell. (I should say, I don’t genuinely think this song counts as cultural appropriation in any way, just incredibly tacky).
I’ve already talked about Regine’s performances on this album. Win Butler is fine, but he’s still Win Butler, so he kind of just sounds like someone’s uncool uncle who thinks he’s hip, singing over these disco beats. His only performance that I really hate comes on another one of my least favourite songs from the album, and that’s ‘Signs of Life’. I hate the way he stresses some of the syllables in this, “SIGNS OF LI-EEF”. Win Butler? More like Lose Butler. Am I right, lads?
The instrumentals get repetitive and fairly jarring, sometimes even annoying or bleak. I mentioned how I like ‘Electric Blue’, but it’s easy to be turned off by the high bit that comes after the chorus. I’ll just blame Will Butler for that. Will Butler? More like Won’t Butler! I just wanted to make that joke, I’ll see myself out…
But man, I’ve never heard a band try to put together such a golden shower of sounds only for it to end up like a golden shower. I guess the appeal of golden showers differs from person to person, and so that’s a decent enough metaphor for this album, because I can see some shitheads enjoying it. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it’s complete trash, or necessarily a fall from grace considering the artist, it’s just a remarkable stylistic fail.
And so, what else is there to mention? I could talk about the lyrics, but they all follow the same kind of hammy ‘good times’ verbiage, kind of helping ‘Good God Damn’ sounds even more like an Arctic Monkeys song than it already is, a bad Arctic Monkeys song, by the way. It’s not quite the same ilk as a lot of the modern ‘partying is so deep’ kind of writing, but that cross of pessimism with good vibes definitely gets a bit old, unless we’re talking about ‘Creature Comfort’, a song that is actually quite catchy.
So, when you end up listening to one of the most uncool albums of the year, just know that the Butlers did it. ‘Everything Now’ is an album that sees Arcade Fire try to rinse every colour from their disco influences, try to create a rainbow of sound, but it all just ends up sounding white.
Favourite song – ‘Electric Blue’.
Honourable mention – ‘Creature Comfort’.
Weakest songs – ‘Signs of Life’ – ‘Chemistry’.
Rating – D
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