New Future Islands

Enjoyed the album on first listen. Feels less hookier than the preceding two to my ears but their sound is always such a nice soothing balm.

Found this interview interesting. I think The Far Field is great so very surprised they aren’t happy with it:

It deffo feels like it has a lot more feeling than The Far Field which did feel like a lesser sequel to Singles (i did enjoy it still) New record deffo has their sound all over it, but the songs sound more developed and I think its the best sounding record they’ve put out. Whether or not the songs stack up to earlier efforts will be subject to repeat listening but there deffo feels like there is more depth here on first listen

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Just listening to it now. I liked the Far Field at the time but it didn’t have any lasting impact on me.

So far this one is great. Born In A War is incredible on first listen.

Very impressed with the new album. I like Singles but separated from ‘that performance’ it didn’t feel as great as some people were making it out to be. The follow-up didn’t grab me at all. But so much good on this one.

Have been rinsing this since Friday. It’s really coming alive for me.

I’ve not been a huge fan until I heard For Sure, now I’m addicted

Love this band a a singles (no pun intended) band, but despite listening to a few of their albums quite a few times, for the most part I couldn’t tell you which album individual tracks are from, apart from the obvious bangers. But those obvious bangers are so glorious, and I just wish every song of theirs were as memorable as this one, for example.

I guess their albums need more re-listens than I have time for.

Don’t want to begrudge Future Island’s crossover appeal (I like them), because god it must be hard to catch a break if you’re a band like that. Not knowing in any way how their record sales match (for all I know Future Islands might be lower) but I feel like a band like, say, Destroyer, have been more much consistently releasing quality albums in the same period of time (and before) that I wish they had caught the same break. Not sure if Dan Bejar particularly cares, but you know.

Not that I think Jools Holland is the hallmark of a band ‘making it’ but I just searched on youtube for ‘Destroyer Jools Holland’ and the third result was Future Islands doing ‘Seasons’ on his show.

This new record is a welcome return to form, great songwriting.

I really really like this.

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It’s a really brilliant record. I had a pretty huge chat with Sam about it for the new issue of GFP, turned into a massive 7 page interview feature in case anyone’s interested! One of my favourite ever interviews.

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Don’t think any of Destroyers material comes anywhere near close to Kaputt. Could’ve seen them crossover at that time if Dan had done a silly dance mind.

This is a good album on first listen by the way

Voice still sounds a bit too close to Vic Reeves’ club singer for me to get into I think. Annoying cause I liked quite a lot of this musically from 1 listen

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I understand why people don’t care for his voice but for the life of me I dont get the appeal of the band without his voice. As far as I’m concerned sam is the reason people come to future islands. Just surprised someone would listen to them/want to listen without him (not that the music isn’t good, it is, just so much of their identity is in the vocals)

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Think they make some quite nice synthy pop music. Nothing groundbreaking or anything but something I’d happily have on.

I guess his voice being polarising means people who like it like them as a band much more, which is probably why they sell more tickets than other bands of a similar ilk so fair play to them.

And, of course, because of the funny dance

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There are a couple songs where it’s a bit much (track 4 or 5 I remember grating a bit) but I didn’t think it was as bad as on previous releases as a whole

Couldn’t agree more , the only reason I’ve take any interest is him.Watching them live ,I’ve always thought this lead singer is great but the backing band might be the most boring on the planet. I actually wish he fronted a more interesting band.

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end of tour in Glasgow!? yes please