Album Reviews

Between the excessive sprawl of 2013's James Murphy-produced Reflektor and the failed experimentation of 2017's punchable Everything Now, it might seem as if Arcade Fire spent the last decade actively trying to lose people's interest. Now, however, they're back; at least, that's what their Nigel Godrich-produced new LP WE wants you to think. Split into more introspective "I" (A) and outward-facing "WE" (B) sides, WE is a concise 40-minute summation of the band's previous work. Every Arcade Fire record finds them striving for epic heights and always falling short, though you can't say they're not trying really hard.

Yet, WE's intense effort comes across as forced and calculated, as if they're trying to unite their fanbase and, for that matter, the entire world. WE is one of those albums, a "we're all in the same mess together so why don't we all support each other and make the world a better place" type record, but Arcade Fire merely regurgitate information you already know: COVID happened, people got anxious and started self-medicating, the internet is a consumerist rabbit hole distracting you from actual world issues, race and religion unnecessarily divides people, and millennials who came of age with Funeral now have kids to raise. If he tried just a bit harder, frontman Win Butler could outdo Bono in worldly pomposity; from the album announcement letter name-dropping the missions of MLK and Buddha to the lyrics' forced togetherness and Coldplay-esque navel-gazing, WE reeks of the most unbearable sort of ego.

But how's the actual music? WE's biggest problem is its inconsistency, with its 7–12 (depending on how you count them) tracks ranging from excellent to cringe-inducing, often by the minute. "Age Of Anxiety I" thoughtfully if belatedly ponders peak COVID claustrophobia, yet never finds depth and musically builds up to essentially nothing. Its succeeding second "part" (really an entirely different song), subtitled "Rabbit Hole," uses well-assembled yet rather bland pulsating electronics to back its absolutely laughable lyrics: "Rabbit hole (yeah)/Plastic soul (yeah)/It's a real rabbit hole (yeah)/Rabbit hole, yeah, yeah, yeah!" (the impassioned Tonight Show performance of this song, with Butler and wife/bandmate Régine Chassagne's self-seriousness on full display, ended up looking quite foolish).

"End Of The Empire I-IV" gracefully begins with the "Last Dance" first part, significantly builds up during the "Last Round" second segment, achieves luscious beauty on the melancholic "Leave The Light On" third movement, and throws it all out the window during the four-minute final part, on digital versions separately indexed as "Sagittarius A*." Once Butler wearily exclaims "I unsubscribe," as if it's a triumphant rejection of online consumerism (the same system used to sell us this record, for better or worse), any ability to take him seriously is lost. It's a shame; "End Of The Empire" makes many valid points throughout, but the poorly presented "Sagittarius A," on which Butler and Chassagne contemplate black holes and the internet's assault on people's self-esteem, nearly ruins the rest of the otherwise elegant song, and significantly dims the first side as a whole.

Luckily, lead single and side two opener "The Lightning I, II" amps up to a burst of euphoric chamber pop-inflected heartland rock; concerned yet hopeful, it ranks among Arcade Fire's very best, even if it's a bit pandering (it seems that heartland rock effectively soothes fatigued millennials). "Unconditional I (Lookout Kid)" is a touching folk rock song for Butler and Chassagne's son, though good dance-pop production and an excellent Peter Gabriel feature can't fix "Unconditional II (Race And Religion)"'s nonsensical and utterly baffling lyrics ("I'll be your race and religion/You be my race and religion/This love is no superstition/United body and soul," Chassagne sings). The earnest acoustic closer "WE" sounds like it'll reach some epic moment of catharsis, but is instead a dull and inconclusive end to this wildly uneven LP.

By aiming for stylistic variety and trying to say something about everything, WE feels labored, lacking thematic depth and overall cohesion. Instead of adding new perspective, Arcade Fire opt for a surface-level survey of our world that's too clunky and scattered for longevity. The dystopian technological unease is philosophically reminiscent of Childish Gambino's 3.15.20, except that record was more focused and didn't care if people liked it or even heard it. On the other hand, the forced togetherness (lines like "Rabbit Hole"'s "Until the world is made whole/One body, one soul" and basically all of "Race And Religion") revives painful memories of Richard Ashcroft's United Nations Of Sound and Coldplay's Music Of The Spheres, two records whose fake deep, grandiose universality failed most spectacularly and hilariously. Arcade Fire certainly aren't as mediocre as later-period U2 or current era Coldplay, but Win Butler certainly sounds a lot like Bono and Chris Martin: asking all the same worldly questions with seemingly little genuine urgency and coming up with elementary answers that don't ease the everyday struggles, but obviously trying very hard.

WE has a smattering of vinyl variants, though the standard black vinyl is divided between a European edition pressed at GZ, an American edition plated at GZ but likely pressed at MRP, and another edition sold in North America but pressed at MPO. All of them are 180gm LPs cut by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound, and there's no way to distinguish sealed copies of the MPO and MRP pressings. I ended up with the MPO pressing, which sounds okay albeit a bit muddy; the mix itself is dense and compressed, the levels between song sections aren't the most even, and there's little breathing space to begin with (the MPO LP sounds equal to or slightly worse than the 24/96 file). Side 1 has some mild inner groove distortion, and the pressing quality is average (mine was noisy and scuffed out of the package, though a vacuum clean helped).

The packaging consists of a glossy and embossed gatefold jacket, a 36×'24" poster with credits, a removable tracklist card lightly glued to the back cover, a printed inner sleeve with lyrics, and a 4" square "I Unsubscribe" sticker that gets more annoying each time you see it. For a $31+ single LP, it's a satisfying vinyl package, but only if you plan to look at it frequently.

(Malachi Lui is an AnalogPlanet contributing editor, music obsessive, avid record collector, and art enthusiast. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.)