Fun. - Some Nights

I find it very difficult to access the merits of the music of fun. Their work seems to be equal measure of really offputting traits (corny hooks potentially lifted from Freddie Mercury's posthumous recordings, reducing the presence of Janelle freaking Monae to a tacky four-note semi-melody, the constant use of vocoder on Nate's fine voice which can be used to great or grating effect but feels a bit unnessessary) and some traits which I really really like (their love of Kanye West's music and inspiration to make unconventional use of MPCs hence the presence of Jeff Bhasker on production, the detailed layers of confused and uncertain emotions in their lyrics discussing matters from existentionalism to self-doubt and all the other matters, possibly another example of Kanye's influence, Jack Antonoff also has a pretty neat guitar style whose frilly solos do a good on upping the rock side to their music when neccessary). Anyway while the two big singles were a bit irksome on first listen (and still are in some places) but they've grown to be enjoyable tunes I'm always in the mood for. Thankfully the rest of the record is still pretty consistent, if slightly lacking the impact of the intro + hits section. I'm nevertheless pleased by what their aiming for with their music and hope the experimentation of hip-hop sounds out of hip-hop context continues to grow. After an era ten years ago of stupidly obvious combinations of rock and hip-hop from the shitty likes of Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit, they've managed to combine the two in a way that doesn't sounds much like either normally would, and that's definitely something.
Laatst gewijzigd: 28/10/2013 05:26