Album Review: M83’s “Junk” Is Fun, Melancholic, and Completely Electric
It is no secret; I have an odd appreciation for techno-music. Something about the synthesizer represents, to me, the emotional abstraction of our minds. It is our minds that receive the images of our feelings. It is like a sentiment receptor, and M83 uses electro-pop/ techno to shows that the chords of our heart are dissected in our brains. They create music that makes you dream. Hence, their 2016 record, Junk, is one of my favorites of the year, and welcome back to the French band after a five year hiatus.
Junk was released five years after M83’s hit record Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, which is one of the best electronic rock albums EVER. They set a pretty high bar, which explains why for Junk, they did not try to measure up, but, instead, try to measure different. While Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming feels like an astro-orb of cosmic sounds, Junk feels like you are hitting the nightlife of some popular, intergalactic. They still keep the starry sonics and lyrical/ emotional nuances they are known for, but Junk does not try to be as vastly and dreamily ornate as Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, which felt like an impossible feat. Once, you create something that is distinctly great on its own, your only option is to create another great distinction that is the opposite of it. Thus, if their previous record felt like soundscape of one’s mind, Junk felt like a soundscape of one’s nightly life, with hints of other- era/ galactic escapism.
Though Junk can be considered as sonically decorative as Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, there is a tussling of upbeats and down-tempos that reflect the techno-dance scene of the 80’s. Whether you are sulking with your friends in a booth over a lover (“Solitude“), living it up like there is no tomorrow (“Go”), or walking out into the crisp dawn after an eventful night (“Ludivine“), sonically and lyrically, Junk feels like a complete night in the life of an 80’s personality. Again, this person is definitely from an 80’s genre life in outer space, as felt in the interplanetary vibes of “Moon Crystal” and “The Wizard“, but the point is that they are a thinking/ feeling being that every listener can relate to: anywhere and anytime. Moreover, from the first bouncing track (“Do It, Try It”) to that last, pensively pacifying one (“Sunday Night 1987“), you feel like you have partied and recapped with that person. Thus, Junk is a visionary album to dance and enjoy.
Led by Anthony Gonzales, M83 has spent the last decade serving music that teeters between uplift and uprise. They create tracks that sonically overpower listeners to either bring out their inner bliss, rebel, crier, and, above all else, thinker. M83 makes music that you can see, and in Junk you can see yourself rocking a glittery, neon jumpsuit under laser beams on a Martian dance-floor. Yet, even in a “night-out” in Mars, you undergo the same sentimental ups and downs of living. For More Information on M83 to Buy Junk Click Here.
