Playing in the Binaries

Listen to this and have a better day than you were having before.

2012 Albums of the Year:

10. Anberlin - Vital 

For reputation’s sake alone, I hesitated to place this album at the ten spot on my list. Like several other bands I like (Thrice and Muse come to mind), Anberlin inspire both derisive dismissal and rabid support from a very limited number of people, even as they fly under virtually everyone else’s radar. On some level, Anberlin really is that straight-faced, overly enthusiastic emo band from high school that has, despite the odds, labored on making music for a relatively small niche audience with little market exposure. Sure, Cities got some great attention, but that landed back in 2007. What could Anberlin possibly have been doing these past five years?

Preparing to release Vital is what Anberlin have been doing.

Vital is Anberlin at their tightest. The record, with very few exceptions, has a gleefully narrow muiscal focus: loud bombast framed within 80s new wave synths and delivered within the constraints of candy-coated pop hooks. There’s no doubt whatsoever that Vital is Anberlin’s heaviest album to date - Someone Anyone and Desires alone ae heavier than almost anything else the band has produced. There’s also no doubt that Vital is Anberlin’s strongest connection to bands like Duran Duran and A-ha, bands that Anberlin frontman Stephen Christian has flirted with from the very beginning but only now fully brings to bear on his own work. Vital is Anberlin firing on all the cylinders it has. The rhythm section is relentless, low-slung, and louder than any pop album has a right to be. The guitars are energetic, imposing, and straightforward. The synths give me the urge to watch Ryan Gosling’s Drive again. 

Of course, Anberlin’s biggest strength has always been Christian’s vocal performance. It continues to shine on Vital. Though Christian has, for the most part, left is pretty, silky voice to stand on its own in times past, he tampers with his pipes a little more directly here. On Innocent, Modern Age, and Type Three Christian runs his voice through fuzzy, shimmery filters. Self-Starter, Desires, and Little Tyrants see Christian recovering some of the aggressive growl he showcased way back on Anberlin’s 2005 record Never Take Friendships Personal. Throughout the record, Christian’s voice has incredible range in pitch while maintaining perfect stylistic consistency. It, like all the other elements of Vital, fits the record perfectly. Christian’s vocal performance is the obvious anchor point for Vital’s stylistic focus. When Anberlin embraces the atmospheric swirls of Type Three, it’s because Christian’s voice makes it work. When Anberlin does it’s best impression of Muse’s Stockholm Syndrome in Desires, it’s because Christian’s voice can drive that energy. In Vital, Anberlin have finally crafted a solid album around Christian’s voice rather than trying fit his vocal into whatever music the rest of the band churns out. The result is the most fun, catchy, and cohesive music Anberlin has ever produced.

In a year where electronic music was abused by everyone from Lana Del Rey to Papa Roach, Anberlin’s Vital shows how a rock band can make a pop record with a heavy implementation of synthesized sound and come out with something that doesn’t smell like doo-doo. Sure, Vital has it’s missteps. God, Drugs, & Sex is silly in its self-importance (surely an attempt to recapture the magic of Cities’ closing track). Everything on Orpheum that isn’t the bridge or the outro is boring as hell. Taken all at once, the album can even feel a bit fatiguing with all its earnest bombast. These slips in quality shouldn’t prevent anyone from appreciating what Anberlin has done with Vital. Vital is a refreshing bit of blaring sincerity that never lets you forget how much fun it is to listen to. Skip that last track if you must, but queue up the rest and you’ll be surprised at how well Anberlin has weathered the cynicism of 2012’s pop music scene.

Key Tracks:

• Little Tyrants
• Innocent
• Desires
• Type Three
• Modern Age