Review Summary: With their third record, Manchester quartet Everything Everything find the perfect balance of infectious indie soul and existential dread
Everything Everything have been on my radar ever since their first single Suffragette Suffragette begged the question, “who's gonna sit on your face when I'm gone?”. Their hyperactive 2010 debut was packed with fantastic songs, but came across as scrappy and scattershot; too ambitious for a first attempt. Arriving three years later,
Arc reined in and refined their progressive indie sound. It certainly had flashes of utter brilliance, and brought them well-deserved recognition. The album itself, though, suffered from odd pacing. Where its predecessor
Man Alive had fired on all cylinders throughout with only a handful of quiet moments, the ambient, downbeat tracks began on side A and took up at least half of the runtime.
None of these criticisms ring true for Everything Everything's third long-player,
Get to Heaven. The Mancunians have honed their skills and taken the lessons of the past into account to showcase their wonderful idiosyncrasies in perfect proportion. Vocalist Jonathan Higgs kicks off proceedings by goading the sceptics.
“So, you think there's no meaning in anything that we do?” he coos in To the Blade, before drums, bass and grimy baritone guitar leap out of the speakers and punch you in the face. From here, the record's disco heart rarely stops beating. When dealing with such uncomfortable topics as terrorism, climate change and corruption of both the religious and corporate variety, the music remains breezy and danceable. Regret, with its swinging drums and call-and-answer backing vocals, could almost be a Motown track. Bright, tropical single Spring/Sun/Winter/Dread burrows into your brainstem with lines like “you are a thief and murderer too; stole the face that you wear from a craven baboon”.
Rather than interspersing the more immediate cuts with ballads and dirges, as was the case with
Arc, Everything Everything now find breathing room within them. Chanting “gimme the gun” over and over, the band quietly build tension before Zero Pharaoh blasts into a guitar lick as suited to a mosh pit as a dancefloor. This knack for light and shade throughout
Get to Heaven means No Reptiles' swelling, emotional apex comes as a welcome respite from the giddy chaos instead of a distraction from it. Higgs creates an atmosphere of genuine unease here, likening people to “soft boiled eggs in shirts and ties”.
“I'm going to kill a stranger” he sings with violent relish.
“So don't you be a stranger”.
Beneath its polished surface, this record rewards a careful ear with all manner of lush synthesisers, syncopated basslines and unconventional guitar work. The band clearly has talent to spare, but never chooses to show off. Guitarist Alex Robertshaw takes just one short solo, in the title track, which is intentionally raw and spasmodic.
It's something of a miracle that
Get to Heaven accomplishes everything it sets out to. The music provides the melodic dopamine hit required to satisfy the masses, with thoughtful arrangements that display an undeniable mastery of craft. Many lines are infectious, in spite of their often unsettling themes or strange phrasing. Tropes from traditionally African-American genres like soul, RnB and disco sound right at home on an indie rock record from Manchester. This self-contradiction has always been the most interesting thing about Everything Everything. Now they've fully embraced it, and the results are unlike anything else you'll hear this year.
