Of Monsters and Men: FEVER DREAM Review

It's a debate as old as radio: the old stuff is better, right? For me, that means roughly music from 10-15 years ago, as I cut my teeth on it. It's just a tiring willful resistance to what current music is bringing to the table, characterized by what it isn't. Remember Of Monsters And Men's Little Talks? Remember how repetitive it was, how it didn't even have four chords for the majority of the song and no harmony? Make a dance version of it and it will fit right in with a lot of music today. A point that seemingly endlessly needs to be made, replacing the old band in the equation every few years.

I get the feeling OMAM has heard that complaint a fair few times in their career. Nobody wants to be the example of a bad band from X era. Not a lot of bands successfully change their approach for the better, and I think OMAM reeally want to, as evidenced by FEVER DREAM. That's good! It's also....still not great.

It's a "fake it until you make it" pathway that OMAM are taking, and that means borrowing heavily from other artists and styles. There's a lot of influence from pop bands, especially the overreliance on finger snaps and drum loops. I'm not a fan of that direction for this band, because when they don't do that, the music really opens up. On Alligator and Wars, you can hear a strong Bowie or Arcade Fire vibe that fits their personalities much better. It might not be the type of music that they used to make, but it's not betraying their character either. The group is slightly less comfortable in the sections where Florence Welch appears to be their muse, but I wouldn't hate having another band in that realm. That being said, Vulture, Vulture is a high point for the album.

The weaknesses of OMAM do come through when trying to rub shoulders with these artists, though. If you don't naturally have the kind of emotive vocalisms that Bowie, Welch, or Butler have, trying to sound like them just doesn't cut it. I won't try to spell the Icelandic family names, but Nanna and Ragnar already have interesting voices. If they had a different timbre, their early music wouldn't have felt nearly as communal and warm; that's not a bad quality to emphasize. Trying to apply intensity to their voices comes off as an attempt to make up for the weak lyricism. When it works, certainly it's proof that this is a direction they should continue. When it doesn't, it sounds like it belongs on an episode of Rick and Morty, doing its best to pave over that show's bubblegum sadness.

The lyrics really emphasize this issue. When you look at, say, Jack Johnson, he got his fame for writing music that is warm and content. That's no surprise coming from someone who is at his happiest when surfing, and it is easy to be transported to his state of mind because he has such a great grasp on that feeling. Whenever he gets sad or angry, it always comes across as disappointment, and again it is easy to empathize. On a completely different side, it's hard to think about someone like Bon Iver writing upbeat happy music. His kind of happiness comes from a different place.

That's not what's happening here. It's rare that using the phrase "lose control" is a deep thought, and on Alligator is not one of those times. Rororo isn't much better, with melodramatic themes of cliffs, falling, and flower fields. The very next song, Waiting for the Snow, asks in succession "What if I tumble? Have I said too much? Did I love too hard?". It's enough to make me cringe. You can want to sound emotional all you want, but it's just something you can't fake. None of these lyrics give the impression that they're borne of firsthand experiences.

It's tough words when framed this way, but I don't find this music to be a mistake. It's insulting to say the people of this band haven't ever had a hard day in their life. If this is the first album of their new sound, there's work to be done for sure. But there are a lot of points throughout the album that show how what they know can be applied to what they want to say.

There is one aspect of their music that I think has gotten almost universally better: the music writing. These are better verses, choruses, hooks, melodies. This is all stuff that they have built on, though, so it might be the least surprising improvement. That doesn't take away from the achievement, however. Getting better at the music aspect of songwriting is never a bad thing, and it does make up for other weak spots in their overall craft.

If I were more cynical, I'd call this a shallow band chasing trends. If the music were worse, that would be the end of it. But they have put together some well produced, catchy tunes. They're not inept, and they're not willing to sit back on the only method they're so far tried. They have improved as a band, as musicians, as songwriters. It's refreshing to have such an obvious example of that hard work, even if there's still a long way to go. I hope they continue to learn.

6.5/10