M83?

anthony gonzalez played a trio of solo tracks, which ranged from ambient knob-twiddling to some really propulsive almost 'second toughest' underworld-type of track, then the la phil came on and played the part and debussy pieces, then the collaboration. they stuck to 'before the dawn heals us' and 'digital shades' tracks, i think.

Yeh, I figured that from the setlist ... and those are my two favourite M83 albums, by far. *Weeps*.

Really glad you enjoyed it so much. Man, they have to release a recording in some form ...

btw the la weekly review by this hack named randall roberts contends that m83 bombed and that part of the problem was he had written all new compositions specifically for the show, when he should have played his own compositions. (the writer is one of these cut rate replacement level dudes who was brought in from another paper.)

Erm...Randall's the editor of the music section. Friendly guy, too.

(Not to say you have to like his writing, admittedly!)

i'm sure but damn he kinda made something up too about someone shouting something from the audience : /

like someone shouted "yeah!" when the phil started coming out and he turned it into someone screaming "finally some real musicians!" which would be funny except it was being used as an example of turning an audience that was enjoying the show into an audience that was turning on m83 (the crowd was 95% eastside indie kids imo!)

Hmm, weird.

(God this is somehow reminding me of the time I accidentally shouted something to a friend about going to the bar and confused the Ass Ponys, who were on stage at the time. Go figure.)

i remember some drunk girl at a hushed low show thought it would be funny to scream for everyone to be quiet so she could hear the music, which i think resulted in her getting tossed out.

"And that girl's name...was Chan Marshall."

http://www.constitutioncenter.org/timeline/flash/assets/asset_upload_file162_12197.jpg

Yo La Tengo 1950

Brief excerpt from the currently untitled upcoming double album, which is slated for October release and will feature Zola Jesus:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mU6TB8jet-Q&feature=player_embedded

More about the Zola Jesus collaboration here: http://pitchfork.com/news/42738-new-m83-album-to-feature-zola-jesus/

raaah

i like m83 a lot and can even forgive him the blandly panglossian montage that resembles a prestige ad for a finance company

Haha yeah, it makes me think he saw the Tree Of Life and attempted a cheesy homage to the creationist part

Midnight City

^nice sax

any thoughts on the new album? i was hoping the 80s nostalgia thing was just a pleasant tangent, instead it seems our hero is going deeper and deeper into his childhood

A bit disappointing, to be honest - I've played it a bunch of times now but nothing's really sticking. And the first track just makes me wish Zola Jesus was singing on all of them. :/

Anyone seen him/them live recently? Thinking about catching a show on Halloween night.

Am really, really hoping this version is not what the thing will sound like in the end, so I will hold back with my final verdict until listened to it in some proper conditions, heavyweight white-marbled 4LP-Deluxe-Gatefold Premium-Package on a full moon at 4am might do.

Up to this point and with only 3-4 spins it seems to resemble Until the Dawn the most. Minus the the crasser passages like Asterisk, plus god-awful vocals at times, plus pathos cranked up to whole new levels (which is not that surprising). Some real bummers on it though.

9.1

Can't hack the new album at all. It just sounds like a lot of structural pop moves stitched together without any content in the way of good tunes. It's all "drop the synth line for a few seconds and then BRING IT BACK LOUDER" and "ok let's add a choral bit here", but few of the songs have any good reason to exist in the first place.

So yeah, I don't like it. Saturdays = Youth is still brilliant though.

This is a totally self-indulgent 80s comfort food album and I love it

reminds me of talk talk in places

so wrong

This is a totally self-indulgent 80s comfort food album and I love it

― do not wake the dragon (DJP), Wednesday, October 19, 2011 11:58 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

I love how shamelessly epic this album is. I also love how it recalls early Simple Minds. I don't necessarily love how much it sounds like Explosions in the Sky at times.

mixed feelings on this. initial listen did NOT pop for me - kinda felt like a watered down interpolation of m83's greatest hits or something. like, i'm noticing stray elements taken from previous m83 albums, but all reimagined in cheery major chords. at first, it felt way too cheesy. then i remembered thinking back to my initial reaction to S=Y, and how much of a grower that was. so i gave HUWD a few more listens, and it got better every time. it's a pretty deep album surprisingly - very bittersweet. like, "splendor" is a killer breakup song, and wtf is up with the end of "raconte-moi une histoire"... "it'd be great... right?"

some stray thoughts:

- it's interesting how his album-by-album progression into cheese is so positive linear.
- he mentioned in an interview the two discs are meant to be complimentary - each song has a brother/sister on the other disc, which i find mad cool. since i forgot to separately tag disc 1 and 2, my mp3 player plays each 1-1, 2-2, 3-3 song from alternating discs, and i can see the parallels between songs a bit.
- love the joshua tree guitars on "reunion"
- i wanna be a fuckin magic frog. i wouldn't like a world where everything is a damn cupcake tho
- the splendor/wait brother/sister pair are by far my fav tracks on the DD (double disc)
- i like zola jesus but the "ft. zola jesus" is a little ???

oh ya, i also like "echoes of mine" throwing it back to the muffled vocal samples of the first m83 album, then BLOWING IT ALL THE F UP

Reminds me of It Bites in places.

That Fork review not OTM about this being the easiest M83 to listen to in one sitting, and also about the instrumentals all being important. Also, the songs are generally not as strong as they were on the last album, and the tendency toward wordless Coldplay-esque "whoooo-oooa!" ing is downright annoying. But there are enough bits of loveliness and anthemic cheese spread throughout here that I still enjoy it. Just, again ... sort of shameless.

<3 "claudia lewis" & "midnight city"
dont give a fuck abt the rest, i think

i co-sign that post if you switch "steve mcqueen" out for "midnight city"

i totally get why people love this band/album, and i def like them, but idk as much as i want to go head over heels for them... i just can't idk

Listened to some stuff today, and it sounds great. Ended up adding them to this historical Spotify playlist that I am working on: http://open.spotify.com/user/geirhong/playlist/4G7v8uE45O2Hr94Je2Bgy7

I really do love this record, but like in two years this specific brand of Drive soundtrack shrillwave blown-out RETROZANIA is gonna be more embarassing than the Faint's Flock Of Seagulls haircut by 2005, so enjoy this while it lasts kiddies

It's embarrassing now. That's part of its charm.

I've had Desire's album for a couple of years now, and it's still great. xpost

Man, I just realized that half of this album sounds like that Justin Bieber track that was slowed down 800%.

that thing was awesome!

It's embarrassing now. That's part of its charm.

yeah, and the unironic nature of m83's 80s-fixation is a big part of the appeal.

by contrast, my fixation with the starlight vocal band is 48% ironic, and 52% ironic.

Just figured out that there's a bonus track called "Mirror" that comes with the album. You have to find the code on the case underneath the booklet and enter it here: http://www.m83mirror.com/. It's really hard to read and took me forever to make out the characters. Oh, and as for the song, I can see why it's not on the album...

This is a totally self-indulgent 80s comfort food album and I love it

That "Midnight Sun" outro sax solo is right outta the PSB's "Suburbia."

"Claudia Lewis" sounds exactly like New Order's "Thieves Like Us". Or is it just me?

But yeah, the shamelessness in the way he rips off all of his favourite 80's bands is a big part of the album's appeal.

"Claudia Lewis" reminds me a bit of the Ford and Lopatin album (which is obv. influenced by a ton of 80s stuff).

Man, there are some absolutely fantastic moments on here ("Steve McQueen", "Wait", "Intro", "Claudia Lewis", "Midnight Sun"), but enough clunkers to really keep it from being as exciting as it could be from start to finish. I know its cliche to trot this out for every double-album ever, but there is a seriously amazing single disc in here somewhere.

Yeah, it's definitely overstuffed.