Gang of Youths
angel in realtime.
HEY - I wrote this in the weeks before the invasion of Ukraine. And I just wanted to say that, because it's been really weighing on my fucking heart and will forever impact how important this album already is to me.
PLEASE BE SAFE AND PLEASE STAND THE FUCK UP AGAINST THE MACHINE. OK, review time.
Gang of Youths remind me what it was like to just be a huge fucking fan of a band, which I guess I can only really remember when it comes to the bands I loved wholeheartedly when I was in high school more than twenty years ago.
Like, when that band was getting you hype before they dropped new shit and it was magical as fuck waiting for it to drop, and then when it finally dropped and it was just this beautiful fucking blatant growth from where they were on the last release and you didn't question it and you didn't have to deal with people who continually find new and inventive reasons to back out of being a certifiable fanboy of the band alongside you. Back then I don't remember my social circles being full of "haters" or people who only listened to a band just to tell you why they "don't listen to them anymore" and the love for this fucking band wasn't diluted by any amount of appreciation that wasn't 1,001% warranted.
You aren't a fan of that band because the band makes you look cool or anything like that, because yo, when you're alone with the band you don't look cool at all. You're a fucking puddle when it's just you and them. Even watching them in concert, you're ugly as fuck, with your tears leaking from your face and your face is all leaky and wet and shit.
You aren't a fan of that band because you somehow remember every lyric, or every song title, or the order of every song on every album, live album, re-issue, soundtrack, or maxi-single.
You aren't a fan of that band because it puts you into a demographic and you get discounts on haircuts and other toiletries and sundries and you know what sundries are and shit.
I'm a fan of Gang of Youths because of how they fucking make me feel.
I feel like I can grow up with this fucking band in my ear holes.
I feel like I can act like a dumbass with this fucking band on my car stereo.
I feel like I can give myself the chance to catch my breath with this band on my record player.
I feel like I can take the opportunity to apologize to someone I love when this band is on my mind.
I feel like I can be honest with myself and the people around me when I'm focusing on one or two lines of lyrics from some new song I don't know the name of yet from this band.
I feel like I can let things go.
I feel like I can hang on to things.
I feel like I can risk shit.
I feel like I can admit I didn't need them anyway.
I feel like I can trust that I'm going in the right direction.
I feel like I can ask for help.
I feel like I can enjoy dancing alone at a stoplight.
I feel like I can respect the past decisions of my parents while still wishing for more for my own children and their future.
I feel like I can allow others to experience terrible tragedies without the need to somehow compare their trauma to my own.
I feel like I can smell the proverbial roses when I remember to close my eyes when hugging people.
I feel like I can feel all these things without judgement when I listen to Gang of Youths.
Angel In Realtime might just be the follow up to the album I needed that I needed. YEA I TYPED THAT. Go Farther In Lightness made a very large important impact on my life at an insanely vulnerable point in it. So much so, that I have a few lyrics tattooed on my chest backwards, so everytime I get out of the shower I remember:
DO NOT LET THESE THINGS YOU GOT GO TO WASTE
DO NOT LET YOUR HEART BE DISMAYED
DO NOT LET YOUR SPIRIT WANE
I won't pretend to be the guy that knows every song or lyric, but I also won't pretend to not look like an absolute mess when I get myself going on a GoY kick.
The last week of sitting on the new album has been rough in the world around me, and feeling weird for both wanting to listen and not wanting to listen to nothing but the new album at every opportunity is also a new experience for me. A lot of the people around me, including some in my family that I love dearly, are going through some super painful shit at the moment, and it's miserable not being able to fix any of their shit. I sometimes feel like I shouldn't live life too loud when my people are hurting, so I don't give the impression like their pain doesn't hurt me too.
But this album is sort of the connection to that currently-constant experience for me, because I've taken to listening to Angel in Realtime as a way to feel like I can accept the things I cannot control instead of assuming I am somehow in the wrong for not being faced with the same pain as my loved ones.
Yea, that's that unmitigated catholic guilt bullshit that has somehow become a foundational part of every relationship, commitment, activity, goal, success, failure, workday, weekend, day off, vacation away, night out, morning to sleep in, FUCK...
If only learning how to unlearn shit didn't cause so many other emotions huh.
OK FINE HERE IS A REVIEW OF SOME SONGS, JEEZE CHILL.
You In Everything is exactly the right song to open up this fucking album, and the gradual bloops and strings and shit make it feel like you're about to fall into a pool or some shit, but then they cut out and Dave's doing the Dave thing having a singing conversation describing shit in a way that only Dave can singingly converse. "I'll need you in everything..." Fucking romantic ass poetic ass shit, and it feels like he's reading a letter he wrote aloud to his idea of love, not necessisarily a person he loves. And I fucking love that.
In The Wake Of Your Leave starts off like Blue Man Group meets Zamfir, but quickly returns to Gang of Youths music you've never heard but always hoped would exist. Shit sounds like a song you've been singing since forever the very first time you hear it. Like, I'm pissed I'm only hearing this just now. I know this is my first time hearing this, and it hasn't technically been released yet, but I'm kind of pissed it took this long to feel this familiar with something new.
Is every song on this album destined to make a New York City or London based romcom soundtrack starring whoever's cutest at the time? Fuck.
OK, Angel of 8th Ave is perfect, but I've known this since it dropped. This song is a calculated knockout and I've loved it on repeat, and shall continue to do so. Seriously, being able to clap up high next to your face at random times with this song is my favorite.
Returner is a song sung at sea. I'm convinced. Shit feels like I'm on a fucking ship. WHY IS THIS SONG SO FUCKING NAUTICAL?! WHY IS MY SKIN GOOSEPIMPLING N SHIT? I TOO AM ONLY IN IT FOR THE MONEY. I can't wait to sing this song on a fucking boat. That's something I think I need to do, nautically speaking of course.
I feel like Union is one of the songs I'll remember because when it first came out on the EP it stood out as an obvious demonstration of GoY blatantly growing into their sound. This has fucking everything. There's like fifteen opportunities to start new songs and they somehow make all of the left turns right again and meet back at the core of how fucking gorgeous this song is.
Tend The Garden reminds me of sepia filters and unbuttoning my shirt a few buttons and wearing linen pants and shit. Not that that's something I currently do, it's just a vibe this shit gives me. Gang of Youths are fucking massively talented at making songs with a bunch of other little songs in them, and it's super addicting. Any other band would stay put on one vibe, but not these assholes. These assholes keep upping the ante and I've already got all my chips on the fucking table and now I'm out of chips, but my eyes are closed and I'm dancing like Father John Misty thinks he looks like when he starts dancing.
The Kingdom Is Within You is the song that will play at your funeral, when they have a video playing showing some eagle or falcon flying in between mountains during a sunset or some shit. It's just got this massively thoughtful drip to it, and by using the word drip all of the youths in this gang understand me right? HOLY FUCKING SHIT I AM SOARING, DON'T MIND THESE TEARS BROS.
Spirit Boy has my favorite insertion of Dave's ancestral roots in musical form. The chant is tastefully placed right in the center of where my focus is when the song's ocean is parted, and the way it picks back up where it left off pre-chant, and then the layered chorus of voices that delicately leads into Dave's voice again, this shit is fucking magic. How did this band grow up this fast in, WAIT, IT'S BEEN FIVE YEARS ALREADY!?! This is some seriously mature shit, and those strings at the end are so cinematically gorgeous I can almost squint as the sunset gleams off the tide coming in.
Brothers was the track I remembered the most from the GoY livestream show from London last year. It is so intimately inspiring to hear the story of the mystery surrounding Dave's father, and then how it created all of these different life experiences in each of his siblings, and while they each don't fully understand what's a fact and what's just a fib told to improve their lives, they can all lean on the fact that they were loved. This track is as fucking heartbreaking as it is refreshing, because finding out all of these things about your father after he passes away could really fuck a person up, but when you actually TALK ABOUT IT, it's amazing how much it can fuel the fires of your future. Props to Dave for holding that vulnerability like a sword, because I feel his strength every time I listen to this fucking song.
Forbearance is my fucking song. It's also something I've been working on since I realized I have a tendency to default to being a dick. Defined as 'patient self-control; restraint and tolerance', it's a goal (a joel goal) of mine, but not something I display all the time. And these lyrics, holy shit. They hit hooooome. "I was a troublesome young kid. I was a big piece of shit, but I'm hoping that the days in a hospice atone for something", wow. Where the strings lull, the percussion excites, and where the sentiments might feel low at first listen, I love how talking about shit is actually how you approach fixing shit. Admitting you were an asshole is such a huge step towards not being an asshole. And the lyric that hits me the hardest is "the world is not done with me", and I'd like to think THIS is the song I would get tattooed backwards on my chest next to my other GoY tatt.
The Man Himself is another track where you can totally envision it playing during some movie soundtrack that looks back at all of the shit that brought us HERE. Such a gorgeous sentiment and such an unbelievable fucking chorus, Dave is 105% Dave on this track, and I want to BATHE IN IT. Holy fuck, every time he says "I don't know if I'll ever feel right" I feel like he's ME talking about ME and it is inspiring as FUCK.
Hand of God took me three listens to really understand, and I'm positive I will change my understanding of it a few dozen more times in the years and years I plan on obsessing over this fucking album. "I gave half my soul to every hard vice." Fuck. And the fact that these lyrics are peppered in between him singing hallelujah is not lost on me, as my own battles with my catholic upbringing don't mean I don't see things through the tinted lens of having had to bow to that religious superiority that comes from growing into my own while being told to do what you're told but not really wanting to accept life the way it's being laid out in front of me. FUCK (again).
Goal of the Century is the second half of Hand of God (I think), and while completely unique from Hand of God, it has that same self reflective intensity that I felt the first half dozen times I sat with it. So what's the goal of the century? Achieve what we can achieve, but respect the past you came from while improving the future you're entering into, and for fuck's sake love a bit more, yea?
I don't know everything there is to know about anything, but I know that this band, and this particular album, is important as fuck to me. I love how the album is based on Dave's discovery of his father's true identity and history, because the more and more I age and grow into myself, the more I realize the past is where I came from and understanding all that is key to making sure my present and my future are anything but all of the things that haunt me from that past. And the only way to fucking fix shit, is to fucking talk about it. Even if it's just with yourself.
Sorry I rambled.
Not sorry.