This record’s rather tenuous link to the holiday theme was that my good friend Stef introduced me to Everything Everything last summer whilst on holiday in France. I know, I know, but in truth, I have been wanting to play this album at Record Club ever since joining. It is unlike anything I have ever heard before and whilst I cannot truly say that I love it, it fascinates me. And I was really curious to discover the others’ opinions.
The first 3 tracks are an assault. The high-velocity staccato falsetto vocals, the ever-shifting bass line, the sudden key changes, texture changes; its like the band sat down and decided exactly how far they could push the listener. That might make the sound come across as calculated, which is certainly how I thought of it the first few listens, but on repetition the musicianship and craft shine through.
Man Alive is not just about seeing how many notes Jonathan Higgs can spurt out per second though as in the rest of the album the pace slows, the music is more expansive. However they keep hold of the complexity and sudden texture changes. I like the music better when you’re not straining to catch the lyrics, which is probably not a good way to listen to it anyway, but some of my favourite tracks are the slower tempo ones. The creepy ‘Leave the Engine Room’, ‘Final Form’, the barnstorming/barbershop ‘Suffragette Suffragette’ and the lovely, simple ‘Tin (The Manhole)’ which washes over you like some kind of post-modern classical church piece.
I like this album because it sounds like 4 talented musicians got together and decided to push themselves to create a sound that was not bound by any particular style, structure or vocal range. The songs are complex and high-octane but well-written, varied and interesting. From a performance point of view I am also deeply impressed by the falsetto sung by Jonathan Higgs. This is a really difficult skill to pull off, especially when crossing at speed to and from the normal vocal range, and he makes it sound easy.
This is not an album to settle down to if you’re looking for some nice tuneful background music. It’s demanding, complicated and rapid (it has almost certainly failed Tom’s ‘music with too many notes’ test!). And if you are after a big slab of passion and heart, look elsewhere. However if you want something experimental, grown-up, technically exciting whilst also pushing the boundaries of what the players themselves can perform, this is your album.
Rob listened: I really, really liked the fox on the cover of this record. Great picture of a fox there guys. Good work. Well done.
Otherwise, this seemed not so much an exercise in how far Everything Everything could push the listener, more in how far they could push the listener away. Nick is our man when it comes to production and compression, but the sound of this record seemed almost deliberately structured to deflect penetration. Ed’s right that there’s a lot going on here, but it all seemed to be going on at a cold and steely surface, all at the same level, and details were almost impossible to focus on without getting a headache. It was repulsive, in the true sense of the word.
And that was enough for me to switch off, i’m afraid. Which is a shame, as I got that complexity that Ed describes and I got the sense that they were pushing themselves into unusual places. I just couldn’t listen to them doing it.
Nick listened: I feel a bit bad that Ed wasn’t present to explain (or defend, perhaps!) his choice as we listened; a running commentary and enthused advocacy while listening can often blast open records that you’d otherwise shy away from by giving you an understanding of why someone else likes something, even if you don’t. No Ed meant no defense, and thus Everything Everything got an unfair, by our usual standards, hearing.
The name is a clue; they try to do too much, which I suspected shortly after I first heard of them. Initial descriptions – eclectic, gifted, complex – actually intrigued me, but then a few warning signs (signed to a label I don’t trust; Mercury nomination for an ‘indie’ band, etc etc) set off the sirens in my head, and I steered clear. Why? Because I assumed EE would be the kind of too-ambitious, everything-including-the-kitchen-sink act that I’ve been burnt by on numerous occasions over the last decade. And when it came to the empirical test, they were, sadly.
I have a strong suspicion that digital recording technologies are to blame; when you have literally no limitations to how many audio tracks you can record and how much manipulation you can wield via a software package, the creativity and quality control often imposed as a side-effect of technological limitations is no longer an issue, and the result is often, to my ears, inferior as a result. It’s that idea if having infinite choice options, and no wisdom to make the right choice. So you have the live drum kit (to a click-track) AND a drum machine AND some synth AND multiple guitar tracks AND samples AND four ambient room mics AND multi-tracked vocals AND and and and and and… and the result is too much information, jammed too close together. You end up with human music which sounds synthetic, rather than synthetic music which sounds human; people recording on perfect software rather than with imperfect machines. The sound of an algorithm.
The last National album suffered a related fate to my ears; while they didn’t overstuff synthetic layers, they did seem to use every idea they had; violins, several guitars, brass, multiple pianos, etc etc. If you’re skillful you can pull it off, but it’s very very easy to overdo it, and to my ears EE overdid it.
Graham listened: Ed’s last paragraph simply sums this one up for me as at the time it went on, I was still firmly wrapped up in the emotional blanket of Carol King. I wasn’t in mood for anything taxing and my listening skills suffered. Need to borrow this off Ed to give a it a fair chance as I think I would have found just about anything fairly irritating compared to the warm glow I was still experiencing after listening to Carol. I recall warming to second half of this album as my defences weakened.
Tom listened: This is a tricky one. I think this is only the second time we’ve had a record that the selector was absent for (the first one was Bad by Michael Jackson, played by Nick on Rob’s British Number 1 albums themed night – in that instance he didn’t provide a write up so we didn’t get to respond). It certainly felt weird not having Ed there to enthuse us with his insights and, like Nick, I felt that would have made a difference.
I have been aware of Everything Everything for some time now as they have been championed by various DJs on 6 Music for a while now and they have always stood out a little from the standard 6 Music daytime indie fodder mainly by dint of the fact that their singer has a ‘different’ voice. I think it works quite well in catching the listener’s attention – there’s no mistaking it once you’ve heard it a few times – but, for me, it worked far less well over the course of an album than it does when you hear it as a one-off on the radio. The homogeny of the songs on the first half of the record and the lack of any discernible (on first listen, mind) melody meant that, eventually (around the midway point I’m guessing) I had more or less switched off.
The funny thing was that almost as soon as that had happened the album seemed to take a turn for the better; I vaguely recall a song that was a bit slower, had a bit more contrast and was much more compelling that what had proceeded it. And from there on, I kind of enjoyed Man Alive (certainly much more than I had up until that point).
However (and I guess this is down to the compression used in the production of the record), the album sounds like a Steve Lamacq album and, for me, that’s too much of a hurdle to surmount.
Devon Record Club 