Arcade Fire: Neon Bible
Neon Bible
I’m not sure anything about this album can surpass the sheer sonic force and splendor that Arcade Fire gives us. Where previous works evoke old houses with bittersweet memories in empty rooms, here Arcade Fire turns its heart to the sky and fills every inch of space with feeling. Listened to right after Funeral or Arcade Fire EP, the opening track “Black Mirror” sounds like it is meant to shake the dust from the rafters.
Many times, you can hear Arcade Fire redefining itself. In “Keep the Car Running”, the band sheds its conventional indie cocoon with a rock-oriented song that evokes more Bruce Springsteen than (I’m too lazy to think of an appropriate indie band reference; you’re probably better at it than I am, so go to town). “Ocean of Noise” starts off with a dark setting that almost seems smug, but paints a beautiful, terrible picture of an quietly uncontrollable storm. The closing section of this song must be experienced with good speakers, high volume, and your favorite drink. I’m very serious about this. “Black Wave/Bad Vibrations” turns the beat changing device (used in Funeral) in a new direction. Here, the switch occurs at the very center, and it is there to make your feelings hit the brakes to be tugged from hope to terror, uncertainty, and power. This song has a profound effect on me: on my mood, on the way I feel and look at things when I’m listening. The powerful, distorted baritone guitar ties the two sections together, but that just makes it all the more terrifying.
“Intervention” still stands as the centerpiece of the album for me. The organ used in the intro seems to make a statement of grandeur larger than this band can live up to. If not for the climax of the song, I don’t think it could. Stick around for the chorus (not the song structure, but the group of singers). They way it melds with Regine’s voice provides the answer to the question posed by the intro, if you will. As an Arcade Fire fan, the re-recording of “No Cars Go!” holds a special place in my heart. It’s a nice companion piece to the old version, and it is the one point in the album that speaks to the hope and release at which the rest of the album can only hint. I’m not sure if the album would be more interesting without this song or if it would completely fall apart under the weight of the world that this band sometimes seems to be putting on its shoulders. In all honestly, I think it is a bit of “emotional sherbet”, something meant to cleanse the pallet before you head into the final song, “My Body is a Cage”, which takes you into deeper places of fear and emotional chaos than anywhere else on this album.
At the end of the day, I love a lot more of the individual tracks on this album than I did on Funeral, but Neon Bible doesn’t make the same kind of emotional journey that Funeral does. It’s an emotional roller-coaster ride, like the part where the phoenix rises out of the flames, but only the part that’s completely on fire. That being said, the feelings and emotions that this album runs through are a bit hodge-podge. Again, I think the best attribute is the wonderful, wonderful sound that this band produced. It can capture you, if you let it, and take you many wonderful (if at times terrible) places.
4.5 out of 5 stars.
