Arcade Fire's sophmore album, 'Neon Bible', leaves their debut in the dust. After the band spent six months of hard craft in a church-turned-recording studio, Neon Bible has burst forth, a beautiful, innocent gem of an alternative album. In typical Arcade Fire fashion each song transports the listener to a completely different world. Glorious layers of instumentation, from acoustic guitars to hurdy gurdies, church organs to arcordians, giving the album a huge, orchestral feel. Highlights of the album include the unrelenting, foot stomping 'Black Wave/Bad Vibrations' with its phoenomenal sing along chorus, and 'Intervention' with it's ominous use of church organ and thought provoking lyrics. The album, as one may guess from the title, dwells on the themes of religion, a tangible progression from the overpowering theme of death and afterlife in their debut, 'Funeral'.
Track By Track...
1. Black Mirror An ominous, mash of guitars, pianos and harmonies, the opening track swells with swathes of discontentment at today's 'TV Culture'.
2. Keep The Car Running An upbeat song musically for a downbeat theme; Butler sings of the end of the world. Again, in typical Arcade Fire fashion, the depth of the instrumentation is huge.
3. Neon Bible Possibly the darkest song on the album, with an almost mantra-like chant of 'Neon bible'. Strings swell over a consistent, unchanging drumbeat. A very brief song, but nonetheless brilliant.
4. Intervention 'Intervention' begins with a huge blast of church organ, giving it a very baroque, sombre tone. The organ continues throughout the song, and it builds to a huge creschendo of crashing cymbals, swathes of strings and barked vocals. My personal favourite song off of the album.
5. Black Wave/ Bad Vibrations This 'song' is, as the title suggests, an amalgamation of two songs. Both very sombre in tone, the opening of the track sees Regine take the vocals, and her distinct voice adds an air of 'tweeness' to the song. Quite out of the blue the second half of the song crashes in, with a huge blast of distortion and a foot stomping drumbeat. Another standout song on the album, this song makes you think, but also want to dance.
6. Ocean of Noise A notably quieter song than the previous on the album, with Butler singing in very deep, hushed tones, reminiscent of Leonard Cohen. As the song progresses the instrumentation and also the energy builds, and again swells to a huge climax.
7. The Well and The Lighthouse This song is the most similar to their earlier material, notably sounding like "Laika" from their debut, but with more guitar and strings added.
8. (Antichrist Television Blues) The most religiously oriented track on the album, tying ideas from 'Black Mirror' and 'Intervention' into the thematic denoument of the album.
9. Windowsill A more sparsely instrumented track, but still very effective. This song dwells upon the TV culture, and is very bleak lyrically, with Butler sining 'World War Three when are you coming for me?'. My favourite song lyrically on the album.
10. No Cars Go This song is a retake of a song on the Arcade Fire EP. It sounds essentially the same but with a larger range of instrument giving a deeper sound. Personally I prefer this version to the one on the EP as it sounds richer and flows better.
11. My Body Is A Cage An extremely downbeat ending to the album. Sparsely instrumented, bleak, and quiet, this song delivers the final aspect of album, completing the spiritual catharsis that this album brings. Swells of downbeat, macarbe, funeral organ finish the album, and bring the perfect ending.
An amazing album, and as far as I can see it is flawless, there is no weak link. Buy it, or regret it!
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