Joe runs through every album on his iPod, mostly in alphabetical order, and offers some brief thoughts. Check out previous columns HERE.
Did you hear that? The sharp cracking sound, like a belt against raw cow hide? That's the sound of me smacking 2017 Joe in the face for completely overlooking Antisocialites. This is the 45th entry in this ongoing series, but it's the very first time I'm gobsmacked at how good the album was and how seriously I had dropped the ball in the past.
The music on this album is a well-worn '80s-tinged dream pop. Lots of blaring, extended hits on the synth in these songs. It creates a nice atmosphere to get lost in. Molly Rankin's dreamy voice helps. It's soft but still somehow soars. She does a great job at inflecting the notes at all the right moments to punctuate the songs with some nice hooks.
Like, listen to "Plimsol Punks," Rankin is all over the place on that song, hitting notes in all directions, and it never doesn't work. Or on "Not My Baby," how she takes the simple refrain of "I'm really not there" and turns the word "there" into a soaring chorus all its own. Or on "Saved by a Waif," how crazy she goes when singing about a haircut. It's fucking great! The best comparison I can make is that it sounds a lot like the Pain of Being Pure at Heart's s/t album. That's high praise coming from this tPoBPaH fan.
The lyrics in these songs are what really hooked me and made me regret not hearing it sooner. I was going to say at first that it was a breakup album, but the more I listened, the more I figured out that was only part of it. At its core, this is a very youthful album, chock full of songs about silly loves and losses, about summer's freedoms, about making mistakes and being young and dumb enough for it to be all okay in the end.
In this way, I kind of hear a lot of, weirdly enough, the Hold Steady in these songs. Not the music, of course, but in terms of the broad picture Rankin is trying to paint with these songs. The Hold Steady and Alvvays seem to share the love of singing about a reckless abandon that only happens when you're young. In fact, I now have a crackpot, Inception-like theory that the protagonist in Antisocialites is actually a character in a Hold Steady song. "Molly Mayhem" (as she specifically called in the song "Hey") is in a Hold Steady song about showing up drunk at your FWB's door at three in the morning, and laughing about it the next day, and other crazy shit happens, all documented by Molly Mayhem throughout Antisocialites.
Clearly this album has been on my mind a lot in the past 24 hours. It's funny how sometimes a great piece of music can be staring you right in the face and you don't even take notice of it. I guess you should be on the lookout for this wonderful LP on PoYB's End-of-Decade List as I make my penance.
Antisocialites
Alvvays
2017
Did you hear that? The sharp cracking sound, like a belt against raw cow hide? That's the sound of me smacking 2017 Joe in the face for completely overlooking Antisocialites. This is the 45th entry in this ongoing series, but it's the very first time I'm gobsmacked at how good the album was and how seriously I had dropped the ball in the past.
The music on this album is a well-worn '80s-tinged dream pop. Lots of blaring, extended hits on the synth in these songs. It creates a nice atmosphere to get lost in. Molly Rankin's dreamy voice helps. It's soft but still somehow soars. She does a great job at inflecting the notes at all the right moments to punctuate the songs with some nice hooks.
Like, listen to "Plimsol Punks," Rankin is all over the place on that song, hitting notes in all directions, and it never doesn't work. Or on "Not My Baby," how she takes the simple refrain of "I'm really not there" and turns the word "there" into a soaring chorus all its own. Or on "Saved by a Waif," how crazy she goes when singing about a haircut. It's fucking great! The best comparison I can make is that it sounds a lot like the Pain of Being Pure at Heart's s/t album. That's high praise coming from this tPoBPaH fan.
The lyrics in these songs are what really hooked me and made me regret not hearing it sooner. I was going to say at first that it was a breakup album, but the more I listened, the more I figured out that was only part of it. At its core, this is a very youthful album, chock full of songs about silly loves and losses, about summer's freedoms, about making mistakes and being young and dumb enough for it to be all okay in the end.
In this way, I kind of hear a lot of, weirdly enough, the Hold Steady in these songs. Not the music, of course, but in terms of the broad picture Rankin is trying to paint with these songs. The Hold Steady and Alvvays seem to share the love of singing about a reckless abandon that only happens when you're young. In fact, I now have a crackpot, Inception-like theory that the protagonist in Antisocialites is actually a character in a Hold Steady song. "Molly Mayhem" (as she specifically called in the song "Hey") is in a Hold Steady song about showing up drunk at your FWB's door at three in the morning, and laughing about it the next day, and other crazy shit happens, all documented by Molly Mayhem throughout Antisocialites.
Clearly this album has been on my mind a lot in the past 24 hours. It's funny how sometimes a great piece of music can be staring you right in the face and you don't even take notice of it. I guess you should be on the lookout for this wonderful LP on PoYB's End-of-Decade List as I make my penance.
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If this album sounds interesting, try this song: "Your Type"
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Stray Observations
- Molly Rankin is a little more than four months older than I am, which means she's a lot closer in age to the type of shit she's singing about than Craig Finn is. That's probably why she seems more like a Hold Steady character to me than a Hold Steady-type narrator of youngster dramatics.
- Not mentioned above is a creepy incident that occurred last autumn at an Alvvays concert, when some fucking jerkoff got on stage and tried to force himself on Rankin. I didn't know how to tie it in to the post proper, but it had to be mentioned because, like, maybe men should be held accountable for this shit?
- Shout out to guitarist and co-songwriter Alec O'Hanley, who I did not mention above, but who co-wrote every song. I have a bad habit sometimes of just assuming the lead singer does everything.
- ALBUM COVER: A bunch of people standing on a cliff, watching a large fire. Perhaps these are the antisocialites, watching as the socialites burn?
- You know, I didn't even consider why the album is called Antisocialites. A socialite is "a person who is well known in fashionable society and is fond of social activities and entertainment." I mean, yeah, there are a lot of moments on this album where our protagonist feels awkward and out of place, but I read that as normal young adult behavior, as opposed to the behavior of someone who is NOT fond of social activities, ya know?
- I didn't mention that this is Alvvays' second album. I have never heard their 2014 self-titled debut album, but obviously it's shooting to the top of my Listen To Next list as we speak.
NEXT TIME: Apocalipstick by Cherry Glazerr
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