This is a good playlist: We Used to Wait,
Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains),
The Suburbs, Neon Bible, and Wake Up
Arcade Fire has released one EP and three LPs. The EP is called simply "The Arcade Fire EP" (2003). And the three LPs are Funeral (2004), Neon Bible (2007), and The Suburbs (2010). I recommend checking out these albums in their entirety, because they are all really that good. I'll provide a few details below.
Funeral (2004)
Favorite songs: Wake Up, Haiti, and Rebellion (Lies).
If you are thinking about buying an Arcade Fire album, I'd go with this one first. I think it's a good starting place. Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album #6 on the list of greatest albums of the decade (2000s), beat out only by a bunch of garbage (i.e. Radiohead's Kid A, The Strokes' Is This It, Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, Jay-Z's The Blueprint, and the White Stripes' Elephant). This critic refers to those albums as garbage, garbage, garbage, garbage, and garbage, respectively.
It was also ranked #8 in a book titled The Top 200 Canadian Albums by Bob Mersereau. It ranked high in the mix, near the top with albums like Harvest (#1) and After the Goldrush (#3) by Neil Young, and Moving Pictures (#9) and 2112 (#17) by RUSH. This was quite an impressive feat considering the monster-legacy and mega-epicness of those artists.
Neon Bible (2007)
Favorite songs: Intervention, Windowsill, and Keep the Car Running.
This was my first Arcade Fire album. I was introduced to Intervention and Keep the Car Running while laying on the floor of my dorm room during sophomore year of college. I was really drunk and watching SNL. They were the guest band and really stood out. During that time of my life they had a big impact on me. Thanks for being you Arcade Fire.
The Suburbs (2010)
I think they released the album with
multiple different covers, which is unique.
Favorite songs: The Suburbs, We Used to Wait, and Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains).
This is their newest album, and I think it is my favorite album of theirs. I think I read somewhere that when they mixed the CDs, they took the sound off of records to try and give that "vinyl sound" too it. I'm not sure if that actually works, but I appreciate the effort regardless. Either way, the album sounds great. I picked up a copy on vinyl too, and that makes me feel special, so yay.
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I was fortunate enough to see Arcade Fire this year in Madison Square Garden with my good buddy Eric Sedler. We lucked out and saw them the second night of their performance, which they were filming for the "Unstaged" series of music videos. The entire concert was filmed. It was awesome. You can find the videos on Youtube.
I can't really say enough good things about this band. I really suggest checking them out. Their only downside is that they are Canadian (just like RUSH and Neil Young). What's that all aboot? I'm just glad that they don't sell their CDs with gravy on them. Whatever, I still love them (you too RUSH and Neil Young). xoxo
