Baby, oh baby, you're having a bad dream. A bad time. Sorry! ("oh baby") There are other voices everywhere. It's time for tin foil hats, anything, to stop them from intruding. But you're still a pushover for passionate people! ("other voices") I used to dance to my own volitions, I used to wait all night for rock transmissions. I'm still trying to wake up--now's your time to wake up! ("i used to") I ain't seen anyone for days, I still have yet to leave the bed. I've just got nothing left to say, and I'm in no place to get it right. And I'm not dangerous now, the way I used to be once. I'm just too old for it now. At least that seems to be true . . . it could be over if you change your mind ("change yr mind") I remember when we were friends, heck, I remember I called you friend. But I can't hear you any more. You warned me about doing the heavy stuff, but then you dove straight in. Thanks for that! ("how do you sleep?") Look, truth be told, we all have the same end. Everybody's singing the same song. I never realized all these artists thought so much about dying. No use crying. I'm telling you, this is the best news you've heard all week. I promise you this, you're getting older. People will taunt and badger you, tell you that you're missing a party that you'll never get over. You hate the idea that you're wasting your youth and standing in the background and missing this incredible thing. But that's all lies. All lies. ("tonite") We don't waste time with love. But should we? I dunno, call the police, call the preachers, sing me the blues, it all goes downhill when we start arguing over the history of the Jews ("call the police") Yes, I'm intense, I know. I caught your eye when I stepped outside with my emotional haircut. It seems I've been misunderstood. You've got numbers on your phone of the dead you can't delete, and you've got life-affirming moments in your past that you can't repeat. But you know what? I'm on my feet! Just listen to my heartbeat! Listen to it now! ("emotional haircut") We really need to hang out again. If you couldn't tell before, I'm bad with people things. [insert existential sigh] ("black screen")
You just read The D Man's part-verbatim, quasi-paraphrase, uber-shorthand essay describing LCD Soundsystem's mind-warp of an album, American Dream. Aching, confused, and self-aware, this is not the cash grab album it could have been (arguably even should have been!) after making a triumphant comeback. Instead, this is a confrontational and urgent record, angry about aging, sad about losing touch with friends and bewildered by changes that keep coming no matter how long you squint at it.
We all know James Murphy called it quits in 2011. Wink, wink. After conquering the indie world with LCD's final show at Madison Square Garden (which was then chronicled in the documentary The Long Goodbye), Murphy wrote articles, collaborated on projects, produced records, and ultimately realized that he was best suited for, yes, of course, making the brainy dance-punk that shot him to stardom in the first place.
While hailed by some as LCD's political record by virtue of its frenetic tone, seemingly responding to the unease in New York City and much of the States, American Dream is actually Murphy's most deeply personal album. Leaving behind the monuments of cool he built on career highlight This Is Happening, Murphy crackles with middle-aged angst as the world around him dissolves into a hyper-balkanized social media experiment gone wrong, where alienation heightens the panic of mortality, no matter how ironic or self-referential he becomes. With the most rock-oriented songs of his career - ragged guitar riffs run around and collide with synthscapes - Murphy tries to exorcise demons with his late-era ramblings, as he puts it; perhaps if he keeps talking long enough, maybe he will find the words that summon the answers into existence.
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