Monday, October 26, 2015

Pagans In Vegas

I have a bad feeling I may have jumped onto the Metric bandwagon just as they’ve started making music I don’t like.  Over the course of their first four albums, Metric were slowly morphing from alt-rock to dance rock, and now that they’ve hit “Pagans In Vegas,” the transformation is more or less complete.  There’s nothing wrong with dance rock in and of itself, of course, but Metric’s habit of putting half-decent melodies behind an increasing wall of electronica becomes tiresome after an entire album.

Highlights!
* I’ve come around on ‘The Shade,’ as I like it a lot more than I did when it was first released months ago.  In fairness, since this is one of the more electronica-tinged tracks on the record, it’s possible I could come around on the entire album itself once I hear it more than twice.
* “Fortunes” is probably my favourite track at the moment, though the little beeps-and-boops opening is annoying.  I’ve noticed that Metric, on this album particularly, is fond of having verses and choruses that don’t really sound at all alike aside from (maybe) being in the same key; it’s like they just write them all separately and then just jam one of each together to make a song out of it.  “Fortunes” is a particular example of this, and it works.

Lowlights!
* The two-part instrumental (“The Face”) that ends the album is very pointless indeed.
* If I never hear some variation of “cover of your magazine” as a lyric in any song (Metric or otherwise) ever again, I’ll die a happy man.

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