Album Review Quickies: September 2013

September has been an absolutely ridiculous month for music. With great albums coming out from the likes of CHVRCHES, The 1975, Nine Inch Nails, Machinedrum, and countless others, there are too many to cover with the few writers we have. So, here's a quick rundown of three which might pique your interest:

Album Rating: A

The Naked and Famous - In Rolling Waves

Let me be the first to express what I'm sure many people's reactions will be to the new The Naked And Famous album: Holy shit. I mean, Passive Me, Aggressive You was pretty good, sure, but this kind of improvement is almost unprecedented. Easily the electro-pop album of the year so far, In Rolling Waves is a fully interconnected, savvy, and intense release which demonstrates beautifully what the group's sound can be at best. A pop album at its core, the release has its catchy moments (the sing-along lead single "Hearts Like Ours, the laid-back "In Rolling Waves), but its really impressive moments come along at wholly unexpected times. Take the perfect crescendo of "To Move With Purpose," which has nearly unprecedented patience in a pop song as the beast slowly builds, adding kick, midrange, and vocals one by one until it finally explodes into a cascade of synth chords and dance beats. The male-female duet of "Mess" works in much the same way, restraining itself and adding on layer upon layer of distortion until the thing breaks loose in a beautiful display of pop music genius. In Rolling Waves comes as a much-needed shock to a somewhat stagnant electro-pop scene, and most of all it's a great example of pop music done right.