On the Dial: Arcade Fire

Arcade Fire - Funeral

This past weekend my mother- and sisters-inlaw stayed with the wife and I.  With four girls in the house, we did a lot of shopping.  Being a sucker for vinyl, I bought a couple of awesome records on our Newbury Street excursion, one being AC/DC and the other Funeral by Arcade Fire.  It's ridiculously good!

Arcade Fire is a seven-member, twenty-instrument, indie rock band from Montreal.  Though I'm just discovering the awesomeness of Funeral six years after it's 2004 realease, I've been a fan of Arcade Fire for quite awhile.  Getting this album just put me head-over-heels for them. Case in point: I learned "Rebellion (Lies)" on my bass the day I got the album.

Funeral is rock solid and I'm not the only one who thinks so.  It was nominated for a Grammy (it didn't win, boo!) and ended up on a multitude of year-end lists - Rolling Stone chose it as the number six album of the decade while it was number three in Paste Magazine's 50-Albums of the 2000's.

I recommend listening to any album you buy front to back, track one to track done, but if you can only sit still for a song or three here are my picks off this LP.  First, "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)", one of their first real singles.  Written during a power outage in Montreal and full of energy and angst, "Power Out" is one of the darker tracks on a fairly dismal album.  Arcade Fire isn't a band that evokes joy. My second pick, "Wake Up", one of the most powerful songs I've heard in the past few years.  It starts with a single bassline and builds and builds into an explosion of voices that sends a rush of energy through you. Each time the song approaches the chorus and the singers join in together I feel it inside! I love that song.

Finally, "Rebellion (Lies)" is a great song with a steady rhythm and great female vocal accompaniment. Out of all the songs on this album this track is the most commercially accepted.  Most likely you've heard it on the radio already and loved it just as much as I did.

Regardless, grab this album and become a fan because this band isn't finished making amazing music!

Sounds Like:

  The Polyphonic Spree

  Vampire Weekend
  The Decemberists
  Wolf Parade
  Clap Your Hands Say Yeah