Quick Thoughts on those Two New Arcade Fire Single

If that is starting Suburbs I will be so happy, but...I hate the double-tracked vocals and slow vocal phrasing right now. The bassline feels ugly, just going along on its own. It...this is arcade fire's new direction, I follow, but I'm not getting the same sense of invention that I did before. It feels like a radio bite. When the drums re-enter around 2:25 I feel them, but then I lose them again. The songs on Funeral took the entire track to reach their climax, but never lost their strong energy, which derived from simple parts mixing in complex and beautiful ways. On first listen this song lay down on the table, took its clothes off, and screamed at me for a bit, and then fell off.
On second listen the groove feels more like a baptism. I guess the simplicity of it is jarring me. The instrumentation is like a punk band with a synthesizer, that's part of what throws me off. Still, this feels too processed to me, it's swells and falls back on its noise, not the spirit that was so clear on the last two LPs. Black Mirror, by contrast, swelled in slowly and then hit you over the head with its power. I'm not sure this more...sideways, punky, radio-conscious, simple startup really speaks to me like I was hoping it to. This is the first time I've had any concerns about the new LP. I'm liking the song more as it goes on, especially that breakdown has a lot to it. I'm just...concerned.

This is also different, more punky and radio in its production, but this is more welcoming in its lyrics. There's more going on under its simple groove; the bassline doesn't feel flaccid or pudgy (...), with the other parts with it. The disco stuff seems weird at first, but that four-on-the-floor drumbeat was always present in their music. This makes a lot more sense to me as a sequel to the rest of their music: innovative, creative in its themes and entrances, and powerful. I still don't "get" the production style, which feels blown out in ways that even Neon Bible wasn't. This electropop vocabulary will take more getting used to. Regine's interjections bring me right back to Funeral, eeee. I just realized part of the problem is my bass-heavy speakers, but still that last buildup didn't have everything I expected it to.

Again, though, this I can give more of a chance than that first track. Also, this album seems to be able music a lot, so the level of commentary about music by enacting either what they're hoping for or fighting against is important.

Overall, I hope I'm able to change enough to appreciate this promise.