Arc

“If it’s gonna happen, let it happen now!” bellows Jonathan Higgs on ‘Duet’, a cello-cradled highlight which lies at the heart of Everything Everything’s second album. Whether you interpret Higgs’ wail as a rousing call-to-arms or a desperate plea for it all to end quickly, it’s clear to see that the Manchester-based foursome have upped their game for album two.

Laying future fears against a backdrop of amorphous math-rock, Arc slants between hopelessness and euphoria, with its authors panicking for the world’s health in the face of twenty-first century maladies. “How can you call this a free world?” Higgs yelps over the herky-jerky verses of ‘Armourland’, its shifts between paranoia and a yearning for warmth setting something of a precedent for the album as a whole.

Think back to 2010’s Man Alive: an eye-boggling collision of tongue-twisting wordplay, glossy efficiency, and nefariously tricky polyrhythms. Arc continues in a similar vein, although packs a much leaner, more focused sound. Opener ‘Cough Cough’ lurches out of the gate, its “comin’ alive!” refrain also applicable to the band’s emotional core, which was always present, but perhaps previously hidden beneath layers of dizzying musicianship.

Arc slants between hopelessness and euphoria, with its authors panicking for the world’s health in the face of twenty-first century maladies.

Arc may sag slightly in its middle third (if only due to its abundance of mid-tempo numbers), but the group’s constant stream of ideas cleaves through any remaining notions of Everything Everything as mere additions to the dreaded category of landfill indie. No way: these guys are smarter and sharper than that. As if to dispel any further rebuttals, Arc’s finale is a force to be reckoned with: the skyscraping guitars of ‘Radiant’ fall away to reveal the devastatingly vulnerable ‘The Peaks’ (perhaps the group’s most openly emotional composition yet), before the effervescent ‘Don’t Try’ ends proceedings on a sprightly, bittersweet high.

It’s not quite perfect, but its consistency with dispensing ideas, intelligence and heart marks this album as an important step towards greatness for Higgs and co. Contrary to its lyrical sentiments, the future looks bright.

Similar To: Bloc Party, Alt-J

MP3: ‘Duet’, ‘Radiant’