Politics in music is like cookies and milk: both are and can be separate entities, but they also go marvelously together. Along with that, politics is a topic that has been hard to avoid nowadays. Everything Everything is here to display that even an album about the gross effects of capitalism can be catchy.
Background
Everything Everything is a UK based indie band, and they are most notable for their record "Get To Heaven." Their first single for the record "Mountainhead" was released in the last quarter of 2023, and they have added a few more singles in anticipation for the full LP. A lot of their work is politically charged, focusing on topics such as capitalism.
Album Highs
One thing that this album does well is that it flows really well. Each track generally has the same tone despite a couple being more somber than others. Where this shows up is in the first handful of tracks. "Wild Guess" through "Buddy, Come Over" are there to introduce the listener to what the concept world is, but then the song "R U Happy?" shows up and flips the emotion on its head. The person in the track is about someone wanting to give up because of the failures their society has bestowed onto them. That being said, the musical tone does not hiccup one bit. If one were to separate the music from the lyrics, they’d get two different meanings.
Another thing this record gets right is building the world within it. "Mountainhead" is a concept record, meant to tell a story. The general theme is about post-capitalism. The forms of capitalism in this story are so far gone that they can barely be recognized as capitalism anymore. In a song like "The Mad Stone," they hone in on the religious side of politics.
Album Lows
Something that this album does well is having the tracks flow seamlessly from one to the other, but it also makes some tracks indistinguishable. It would take a fair amount of listens before someone is able to recognize which is which. Whether this was the band’s intent or not is in the eye of the beholder, but it can be seen as a minor flaw when listening to the record for the first time.
Another thing to be said is that one half of the record is certainly stronger than the other. They did put most of the singles in the first half, leaving the ending tracks to fuse together. "Cold Reactor" and "The End of the Contender" are so upbeat, but by the time the listener gets to the end, they only note the beginning tracks.
More: Living In Fiction makes us fall more in love with a political anthem
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Verdict
This record is a 6.5 out of 10.
Highlights:
"Cold Reactor"
"R U Happy?"
"Canary"
Everything Everything’s record "Mountainhead":
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Kasper Mielke is a music reviewer for The Eastern Echo. He is a women and gender studies major with a minor in creative writing. He has worked for The Echo since the summer of 2022 and has stuck to writing music reviews.
