11th April - M83's Saturdays = Youth

Artist – Album: M83 – Saturdays = Youth

Released:  11^th April 2008             

Sounds Like: Ferris Bueller’s Pretty in Sixteen Weird Breakfast Clubs

In recent years there seems to have been a bit of a trend to embrace all things 80s. Classic cult films such as Labyrinth and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off have become must haves in students' DVD collections, and new(ish) movies such as Drive, Hot Tub Time Machine or Tron 3D owe a lot to their 30 year old ancestors. There’s been a reconsideration of the hairstyles and clothes worn – no one’s going to start wearing piano ties or sporting mullets again (please, please don’t), but there’s echoes of a previous time in the general styles and shapes paraded on the catwalk today, whilst colourful leggings, big earrings and even shoulder pads can be seen on most streets now. Over in television land, we’ve seen new series resurrect the ghosts of Yes, Prime Minister and Red Dwarf, as well as the release of the subpar Only Fools and Horses spin off Rock and Chips just a few short years back. In politics, Mrs Thatcher may have finally giving herself up to the devil and the fiery bowels of hell this week, but her working class battering philosophies are still very much in fashion down Parliament way, where the idiotic clowns that currently run our country no doubt have posters of the 80s most evil (only) Prime Minister taken straight from old Smash Hits magazines and plastered on to their bedroom walls.

In music, there is probably more adoration than anywhere for the decade that taste only really had a fuzzy memory of. Bands like Cut Copy, MGMT and Passion Pit obsess over synthpop. Destroyer’s Kaputt, released 2 years ago, is enamoured with the smooth soul and new romantic sounds of circa 1982. Raphael Saadiq is our Prince. Calvin Harris has love for you if you were born in the 80s, the 80s. Which is nice.

But everyone immersed in this 80s fad have warped the time to suit their own needs. They (for the most part) reside in a world where everyone was named Corey and they had a totally radical time dancing Thriller and eating voul-au-vents. No duh, right? Nobody does this more than M83 on this album, which sounds like the greatest John Hughes movie ever made. ‘Graveyard Girl’, one of the albums many highlights, actually has a spoken middle from an outsider teen and references Molly Ringwald. ‘Kim & Jessie’ is swooping, murmured and epic, like The Psychedelic Furs meets A-Ha. ‘We Own the Sky’ does a phenomenal job of balancing retro instrumentation and modern indie rock. It’s just all round a great album. It may see the decade through rose tinted Ray Bans but it’s definitely righteous to be a part of.

Albumaday... rating: 8/10

1.       You, Appearing – 3:39

2.       Kim & Jessie – 5:23

3.       Skin of the Night – 6:12

4.       Graveyard Girl – 4:51

5.       Couleurs – 8:34

6.       Up! – 4:27

7.       We Own the Sky – 5:02

8.       Highway of Endless Dreams – 4:35

9.       Too Late – 5:00

10.   Dark moves of Love – 3:18

11.   Midnight Souls Still Remain – 11:10

Listen to ‘Kim & Jessie’: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Abqy3DdAzHI