M83 - Saturdays = Youth

If you could plug a speaker into my highschool life, it would sound like the new M83, Saturdays = Youth. I'm not sure if that's the case because (a) of all the things I've read and heard regarding Anthony Gonzales' attempts at manifesting this feeling of nostalgia, specifically to the 80's, (b) I've watched the video to "Graveyard Girl" too many times, or (c) this album really just does accomplish what it set out to do- make you feel like an emotional teenager. You would hear Andres sitting in his room making mix tapes solely using songs from The Cure and New Order. You would hear Andres at shows thinking he has some connection with a cute girl across the room because they keep making eye contact. You would hear the red lights of a weekend party and you would hear the fire of a bonfire at Imperial Beach. Although I didn't go through highschool in the 80s, I went through highschool an 80's kid. Every weekend I'd go to Music Trader to look for an 80's New Wave compilation I didn't already have. On the weekends I'd watch eighties movies with Junia, the 80's movie trivia master. She can literally see .5 seconds of a movie from the 80s and tell you exactly what it is. 

Saturdays = Youth brings all your teen drama back but it brings it back in the same heaviness that you felt it when you were 17. The best part is that this isn't a "throwback" record. This is new and this is purely M83 as no one else could have made a record like this. Saturdays = Youth does differs from M83's wall-of-emotion-wall-of-sound from the albums before by taking the same layers they've always used and re-arranges them to let a little air through and which means the album is a little more accessible. Anyone can like this album, which is a first for M83. 

The first track everyone heard off this album was Couleurs, as it was released months before the album and now after listening to this album for a few weeks, I feel it was a brilliant move. I loved the song but was a little uncomfortable with the idea that M83 was not going to be my electronic equivalent to shoegaze anymore. TOTALLY WRONG, in-fact that track creates the perfect break from what otherwise would have been an album with too strong a focus. That track blends and blurs it enough so all the...couleurs (if you will) create an overall beautiful piece of art. If you like this album, go buy it and support them on their tour. They play here in SF on May 21st. Enjoy.

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