PARADOX BROTHER: Murphy maintains his ironic detachment while pounding the dance floor. |
“New York I love you, but you’re bringing me down,” James Murphy croons on the closing track of his second LCD Soundsystem album, Sound of Silver (DFA Records). The tongue-in-cheek refrain bespeaks a genuine concern for his home town; unlike so many young transplants, Murphy lived through the transformation of New York over the past two decades. The city that was “filthy but fine” has been drained of its character, he says, lamenting the loss of the diverse, artistically vibrant community that was an integral part of his youth. “Take me off your mailing lists/For kids who think it still exists,” he declares, denying the myth of New York that attracts so many young people, the very same “art-school Brooklynites in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered ’80s” that he claimed he was “Losing My Edge” to in the now-classic 2002 single.
But the home-town putdowns go only so far before, halfway through the track, he confesses, “You’re still the one pool in which I’d happily drown.” That’s the line he’s walked in this decade. Just five years ago, he jump-started the dance-punk movement with his DFA label, co-producing cowbell-flavored spastic rock singles from !!! and the Rapture that defined a newly merged rock/electronic æsthetic. But it also defined New York (if only for a moment), and Murphy and his music — stylized, cutting-edge, pulsing with energy — have been associated with the city ever since. Like every New Yorker’s “It just ain’t what it used to be,” his recriminations only bind him that much closer to the city.
Sound of Silver serves other contradictory ends. “Get Innocuous!” sweeps vocals around the studio over clicking drums and tweaking lasers that are anything but harmless or bland. The next song announces in its title line, “It’s time to get away from you,” but its jolty vocals and sexy bass line insist that listeners grind closely. This is a dance record, and Murphy’s dry delivery belies the reckless abandon that the music is intended to provoke. The sound is all mutant disco and new-wave sparkles, the ’80s progression from LCD Soundsystem’s ’70s mix of Eno glambiance and early post-punk. The debut album used space and fuzzy guitars; Sound of Silver is all driving rhythm.
There are moments when unalloyed sincerity triumphs, and they are invigorating. A soaring anthem with an insistent piano stab and a wobbly bass line, “All My Friends” could be what’s playing the next time John Cusack’s lovelorn Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything serenades a girl with a boombox. The equally wistful “Someone Great” pulses with dark synths and whirring electronics. Both numbers conjure the ’80s, but Murphy — who’s old enough to have been culturally aware during the real ’80s — knows how to use the past, borrowing the good parts and making them serve his own ends rather than just creating blatant imitations.
And just as he has a love/hate relationship with the city he calls home, Murphy cherry-picks from trends he decries; it’s the perfect reflection of a youth culture that defines itself by its own detachment. Sound of Silver proves you can have that detachment without sacrificing quality or enthusiasm — something his younger peers should take to heart.
