Phoenix: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix Review

 

 

There's a line in the romantic comedy Music and Lyrics where the lead actor says "I'd say that you can take all the novels in the world, and not one of them will make you feel as good as quickly as "I got sunshine, on a cloudy day / when it's cold outside, I got the month of May."". His jab at depth acting all important and superior over immediacy struck a chord with my young self, and has stuck with me ever since. Pop music isn't inherently stupid, and indie music isn't inherently deep. I love it when a band comes along and puts both sides of the argument in their place--in 2009, that was Phoenix.

The Killers and The Strokes had already dominated the airwaves by the time this album came around, and to a certain extent it's a wonder Phoenix was able to arm wrestle their way into the crowded Post Ramones leather jacket space. The Killers, of course, were attacking the genre with glitzy sheen, and The Strokes heaped sweat, boredom, and motor oil onto their strummy songs. In both cases, the genre was riding emotion and strong hooks.

Phoenix wasn't averse to that--they had released three albums full of angsty, hook-filled music. I don't know that it's easy to write music like this, but I can certainly understand how desirable it would be to play it. It's everything that media tells you rock should be. But to stand out, Phoenix needed something more than those basics. They didn't have the boredom, and they weren't as enamored with synths (yet). It's hard to even remember most of the music from that era despite it being no less hook filled or well recorded.

On the first notes of Wolfgang Amadeus, however, you can hear a change in their tone: what was intentionally flat changed to jovial. Lizstomania has a spring in its step that transfers to your own effortlessly. The drumming more bubbly, the guitarwork more juicy. It's not that Phoenix was ever as angsty as The Strokes can be, but it's very nice to hear them not try so hard to be as much.

Everyone probably remembers when their true breakout hit 1901 was in every car commercial, TV show, and baseball stadium. There's good reason for that--it had another great, bouncing hook that was hard to get out of your head. More than that, though, it was weirdly hard to make sense of what notes you were hearing. The cadence and reliance of a wide range of notes to each chord made humming along impossible, but never frustrating for it.

While most songs on the album never reached that level of denseness again, they were nonetheless a step above their peers in terms of construction. A lot of the songs feel like spinning; Lasso, Lizstomania, Rome, all share a penchant for repeated lyrics in a skip-step pattern that makes you feel like you're listening to a zoetrope. The drumming follows suit, accentuating the cyclical nature while the lyrics fill in the gaps, acting like drums themselves.

The production is simple, but it takes a little concentration to notice just how few instruments are being played at any one time. There's a dazzle and juiciness to the way the choruses burst forth that's hard not to be caught up in. It doesn't get better than Love Like a Sunset Part II on this front, which truly will immediately give anyone sunshine on a cloudy day. Similarly, Countdown and Girlfriend crash their cymbals with shots of fond nostalgia through lines like "Do you remember when 21 years was old?"

Of course nostalgia plays a part in my endearing look back at this album: nobody can truly get away from loving the era of music from their childhood and poo-pooing everything that came after it. I wonder if that will begin to decrease as accessibility of music has jumped with the advent of streaming. In any case, I can't help that I could only get a few albums from my favorite bands on my budget. Phoenix, in hitting that nostalgia button, ensured that even though it was new music, it would become effortlessly classic in the minds of those who listened to it on a summer drive with the windows down.

If the themes of nostalgia were the greatest strength on the surface of the LP, the method in which this happened was precision. This is a little bit of a weird approach if you ask me; wouldn't emotion create a certain imperfection in the creation? And yet, especially in the front half of the album, none of this music sounds very easy to recreate without a metronome. It's tightly wound, but it is doing a great job of not focusing on that. There are more stilted and methodical numbers thrown into the mix like Fences and Love Like a Sunset Part 1, but they don't drag the mood down in doing so either. 

It's a good thing they exist, too. Most of what I've written could be leveled at most of the songs on the album. And that....is a problem. There's a very joyous sound here, and they did a great job of construction as well. For this person, Post Ramones bands usually are fun to listen to, but they aren't technically very good, or even all that memorable (realistically I like maybe one Killers and two Strokes songs). Phoenix one-ups them with their impeccable approach. They just run out of steam about halfway through the album. Lasso is too much like Rome, Countdown runs right into Girlfriend, which acts like it will be a different song for a bit, but isn't. As much as I enjoy the stream of consciousness stylings in the lyrics, it's a crutch they lean on a few too many times.

In my younger years, none of these issues were really a problem. When it's all you have, it's easier to begin separating it out. And still, none of the issues sour my memory of what Phoenix made. It still stands as proof that no genre is artless. It still proves that good music doesn't have to be dull, or complicated, or even snobbish. I wish more music would follow suit. Or maybe I just need to adjust my searches and get off my high horse every once in a while.

 

8/10