Album Review| The Suburbs by Arcade Fire

• Tweet

Growing up in the suburbs has always been a somewhat remarkably indescribable phenomenon which tends to leave people somewhere between conventional success and a feeling of mundane isolation. In the Arcade Fire’s case that isolation brings profound wisdom and retrospect upon the world of the mostly under-explored inner-turmoil of the individual, as well as putting it into a global perspective that we can all relate to (regardless of our neighborhood). While the Arcade Fire’s previous albums served as meditations on death (Funeral) and global destruction (Neon Bible) The Suburbs stands as a stunningly cohesive philosophy on life.

The aptly self-titled opener (“The Suburbs”) is an all-encompassing foreshadowing of the album’s individual sentiments all rolled into one remarkably restrained emotional overture. Win Butler reminisces on the “wasted time” of youth and young love as well as charting the swift nature of destruction and loss of identity. Following “The Suburbs” are indulgent examinations of individual facets of an existential crisis. “Ready to Start” suggests failure as a subjective point of recovery or better a starting point to life, while “Modern Man” highlights the arduous task of distinguishing yourself from the pack, as well as serving as an encouraging challenge to self-evolve. While “Suburban War” is a a haunting ode to dependency and the frailty of individuality that climaxes with Win singing “All my old friends, they don’t know me now” as he painfully accepts his self-dependence. “Month of May” re-sparks optimism in the album as a freight-train barrels down the tracks, compelling all to be hopeful. “Wasted Hours” and “Deep Blue” are heart-felt reminiscence of the origins of our current condition that leave you a tad melancholy.

The Suburbs begins to close with a stark observation on the overall lack of patience of the world on “We Used to Wait”, with Win speaking about the rubble and restructuring of life, while contrasting the times with a dueling piano and synth. “Sprawl I” leads you towards darkness but right as you become deeply saddened Régine Chassagne pulls you to the “surface” on “Sprawl II” where the darkness becomes more of a challenging obstacle over sunny synth layerings than an all consuming force. (Synths have never been more appropriately utilized in music than on “We Used to Wait” and both ends of “Sprawl”).

Rarely do albums challenge the listener outside of the confines of the band, and rarely does this quality fuse with challenging the masses. Throughout the album the Arcade Fire’s teachings astoundingly resonate due to balanced instrumental composition and Win Butler’s concealment of conviction, which place his most important warnings in a position of his and our questioning. It’s the questioning that make The Suburbs such a successful album; for the first time the Arcade Fire aren’t forcing their opinions and because of that newfound wisdom they’ve managed to penetrate into each listener on an individual level and if enough get ahold of this work, The Suburbs could transcend conventionality and isolation and potentially change music.

mp3: The Suburbs by Arcade Fire
mp3: Suburban War by Arcade Fire