For all the noted similarities to Achtung Baby era U2 that were given to Reflektor upon its initial release – an electronic change in musical direction; alternate personalities; the large papier-mâché heads – the closer U2 comparison would be to Pop. Both their aesthetics embrace cultures of excess and dance, both were sold on that prospect to a wide audience and both turned out instead to be the bands’ most experimental and least accessible works. Most crucially, as each release progresses the dance music gives way to the album’s man interests, that of loneliness, isolation and especially death.
Which is especially odd as Reflektor’s inception came from perhaps their greatest period of communion and cultural exchange. First was from a trip to Haiti, the home country of Régine Chassange’s family, where the band were said to go through life changing experiences in embracing the country’s rara music. This in part inspired the song writing process that the band would embrace on Reflektor. On the production end the band looked to influence from James Murphy after the retirement of LCD Soundsystem (up until that point, the pair always seemed to release albums at around the same time and were thus unable to work with each other). Although Murphy insists he didn’t assist the record in a particularly substantial way, his influence at least is felt all over the record, specifically in the album focusing itself on holding on long grooves; tracks on Reflektor tend to last on average between five and seven minutes.
That amount of time (75 minutes over thirteen songs) can get plenty an accusation of an album being too long. I feel the album is in some mid-ground between too long and too short. It’s too long to be direct bullet off energy that ambitious bands tend to reach for but never reach, yet at the same time I can’t think of a song that I would especially want to take away (barring one, but I would be extremely hesistant). At the same time the album is exploring so many ideas and topics: Haitian culture; the ideas of Soren Kierkegaard; the myth of Orpheus; the internet; modern issues of identity. The album could actually benefit with one or two more songs filling its sprawling narrative and ambition, as the small experimental detours at the beginning and end are the only thing that justifies this being a double album.*So that is Reflektor, both rambling and immediate, dealing with the biggest concepts and the whole gamut of emotions associated with them.
In other words, it’s an Arcade Fire album. Only you can dance to this one!
Like their last album, the opening title track sets the tone and themes for the entire record to come. “Reflektor” still maintains a rock aesthetic (something akin to “Sprawl II”), but turns into a dance jam via a grooving synth bass and stabs of saxophone; in a year of many high profile disco revivals that included “Get Lucky” (YAY), “Treasure” (yay) and “Blurred Lines” (…Gaye), this song manages to stand out sonically. Lyrically of course it is more ambitious that any of them, with Win and Regine bouncing off each other images of screens, the stage and the realm between life of death, all in turn acting as a cosmic love story that will extend through the album, along with this images. The song by the end takes a particular turn for the awesome by including David Bowie in the song’s outro, his iconic tones serving a reminder that strange reinventions in pop music has been a long and proud tradition, and long may it reign supreme.
“We Exist” is a song with such a funky beat that it was pretty much destined to be a single. Again a synth riff the band builds upon with big guitars chords and soaring violins, the song initially seems about a story about the difference between generations, the time-honoured story of a parent who just doesn’t get a child’s lifestyle. On that level, it is almost directly an anthem of tolerance (an interpretation heightened greatly by the music video), but by the end of the song the repetition of the title seems more in line with existential fears of life itself.
When this album was first released, I remember “Flashbulb Eyes” being a particular point of contention to people who didn’t like the album. Indeed it is odd that the third song, the position where most bands would put the anthem or single, instead we get a strange number that is predominately electronic sounding until the clangs of xylophones. This was initially off-putting to me, but for me it has become the biggest grower of the album, with its strange echoing chorus and cries of “what if the camera really do take your soul?” being among the catchier moments on the entire record.
Its instrumentation also allows a build up to the sounds on what is my favourite song on the album. “Here Comes the Night Time” is the most Haitian sounding song from a band that made a song called “Haiti,” an electronic carnival dance of multiple suites that coalesces into something unique yet still ultimately a dance song. It revels in the strangeness of its disparate parts, such as in the way that the different riffs of piano and xylophone play separately before building on top of each other. Its lyrics link the nature of the music itself to Orpheus and Heaven, asking “if there’s no music then what’s it for?” whilst linking to the old symbolic battles of darkness versus light that Arcade Fire love to play in.
Whilst I was under no surprise when “We Exist” was released as a single, I was really surprised when “Normal Person” was not. The most clear rocker on the album, this is certainly appropriate for has to be what has to be the most on-the-nose lyrics the banned has ever penned, or most direct lyrics depending on your preference. Perhaps this is all intentional and part of the commentary of being normal, with Win himself saying: “do you like rock and roll music? Because I don’t know if I do.” Whatever the case, Régine’s singing on the bridge remains one of my favourite moments on the whole album, even if this isn’t one of my favourite songs.
The final song to act as though it was a live environment, “You Already Know” is introduced by an introduction by Jonathan “Wossy” Ross as though he was drowning in a bubble. In a way I do feel that both of these suffer from the live component where “Here Comes the Night Time” excelled, as where that track was open and flowing these feel like they would benefit from more polish. That doesn’t take much from the brightest of this song though, in which guitars at times mimic the jingle-jangle of eighties alternative rock.
The last track of the first disc is another album highlight in “Joan of Arc,” which links the album’s Orhpeus parallel to the killing of Joan of Arc, and also in turn a sense of female independence. Although Win primarily sings, this independence is still emphasised by Régine having her own verse in French, all the while the band singing amidst the ethereal sounds of choral vocal and organs. With one of the best riffs of the bands entire career though, it still hits hard.
The second disc begins with the switching on of computers (adding again to the reflection and internet parallels) before coming to the second “Here Comes the Night Time”, which apparently was the song written first for the album. The melody here is very similar to “Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails, and also deals with never-ending feelings of sorrow, here characterised by screeching violin strings as opposed to industrial noises.
Disc 2 is where Reflektor both its Haitian, dance and electronic influences even further than the first. The song ironically titled “Awful Sound (Oh Eurydice)” embraces a greater percussive sound that really helps to fill the song with both a celebratory and melancholic sensation. This assisted by the band’s traditional string and guitar sound, but with the rumbling drums it is given a new life where before some of the drums could sound repetitive. This is also where the Orpheus parallels start to take the narrative of the entire album, with the awful sound in question seeming to be Eurydice descending into the underworld.
This narrative is immediately followed on with the soundings of “It’s Never Over (Hey Orpheus)”, which barring the pinning of the electronic guitar could have been a straight on disco/synth pop song. drum Not many disco songs though deal with the subject of entering the underworld to get back your loved one, and with an assortment of drum machines and guitars the music helps to score that recue. Although like in the original story, the celebration of her rescue is “over too soon”.
If there was any song I would take out in the context of the whole album it is “Porno”. But then I wouldn’t want to take out because it is an amazing song, with a groovy synth, keyboard and bass line backing Win’s lyrics detailing how pornography distorts boys perception of women in reality. It still manages to be one of Arcade Fire’s best songs even despite its placement on the album being somewhat suspect. Then again, “Haiti” doesn’t entirety fit in with Funeral in terms of subject matter, so I’ll give this a pass.
The album’s signature sound and its embraces with electronic culture come to a head in Reflektor’s climatic track and another standout “Afterlife”. With some of the best lines that Win Butler has ever penned – particularly the first verse – it is a screed for lost love (“when love is gone, where does it go?”) and where what the “awful word” actually refers to. It ebbs and flows beautifully, with a barrage of synths and guitars that build as fall as clearly as the narrators emotions. By the end, like the narrator, it just wants to dissipate…
…into the final song, the concluding track, “Supersymmetry”. Like a reversal of Neon Bible, where the optimistic “No Cars Go” gave into the distrustful “Body is a Cage”, here the moody finale gives way to something that is seemingly happier. That is at least the impression of the music, with quiet percussion and swirling keyboards giving the same impression that we get of the narrator’s mindset, where Régine and Win duet as a indication that she still lives inside his head. It is still ultimately a melancholic track, for as they both note, this is “not the same as being alive”. Also it scored the trailer to Her, which is a masterpiece. I didn’t know how to put it in here with any tact, so here you go.
So there ends our…hang on *listen to six minutes of questionable ambience*…there ends our short run on the works of Arcade Fire. Short, of course, because there is still more to go, but Reflektor is in its own way the story of ends that gives way to a new start. And while not all of “The Reflektors” debut works as consistently well as the debut of Arcade Fire, when Reflektor does work the highs are higher than any of their combined records.
Still, that feels premature to say. Two years later and there is still no consensus to build around this record. That’s because there is still much more to discuss and ponder. May we be talking about Reflektor and this band, in whatever its forms, for many years to come.
What did you think, though?
Arcade Fire Album Rankings
- Funeral
- The Suburbs
- Reflektor
- Neon Bible
*The band recently came out with a deluxe edition with an EP of 6 extra tracks to complement The Reflektor Tapes. I didn’t have time to truly explore, but my impression: It almost has a different feel to the rest of Reflektor to be part of its narrative. This is the release from Arcade Fire that most borrows from the music of the American blues. Keeping with U2, it’s like their version of Rattle and Hum, though they committed to it being an EP and not an actual double album bloated mess.