M83’s latest album, Saturdays = Youth, is sole band member Anthony Gonzalez’s paean to the music of his childhood. Marked by the electronic drum kicks and synth-heavy ballads popularized by Kate Bush and the Cocteau Twins, the album is so steeped in ‘80s production values that it’s tempting to dismiss it as a genre exercise with no enduring value. But the style works, and Saturdays = Youth’s best moments stack up well against M83’s back catalogue, even if it runs out of steam before its finish.
Opener “You Appearing” builds from careful acoustic piano to a trademark M83 keyboard soundscape, and it sounds a lot like 2003’s Before the Dawn Heals Us. It’s with the cheesy drums and echoing synthesizers of “Kim & Jessie” that it becomes clear Saturdays = Youth is an entirely different record. The songs are more obviously pop songs than anything else in Gonzalez’s oeuvre; female vocalists are featured prominently and memorable choruses take the place of the schizophrenic, electronic pseudo-prog of past releases.
Sometimes, that’s a good thing. First single “Graveyard Girl,” with its flanged guitar riffs and reverb-drenched whispers, evokes the kind of nostalgia for the teenage years that Gonzalez was shooting for. The distant, creepy keyboard progression and sugarcoated female vocals of “Up!” is similarly successful.
But because most of Saturdays = Youth runs at an excruciatingly slow tempo, it’s easy to get bored before the end. The novelty of the ‘80s sound inevitably wears off, and some of the weaker songs, like “Highway of Endless Dreams” and “Dark Moves of Love,” don’t work because they’re missing the ambient, vaguely environmental samples that made M83 so endearing in the first place.
Vast, sublime beauty was once M83’s focus, especially on the 2001 masterpiece Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts, but only “Colours” attempts to recreate that vastness here. Breaking away from the ‘80s fetish, it runs nearly nine minutes and relies on an unexpectedly danceable beat to propel it towards its climax. More reminiscent of LCD Soundsystem than My Bloody Valentine, it’s a possible indicator of where Gonzalez will take M83’s sound next.
Saturdays = Youth is a strange record. Drenching the music in layers of ‘80s production values was an odd choice for a guy with tons of potential to make epic music without the cheese, but the results are better than fans might have expected.
Voice’s Choices: “Kim & Jessie,” “Graveyard Girl,” “Up!”
