Passion Pit employ the type of synth sounds the kids of my generation told ourselves we hated in the early 90s. Whether you listened to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg's P-Funk-leavened hits, or whatever other vaguely angst-y music you were into (in my own case a curious blend of 70s rock and jazz, 80s punk and Primus), the synth-driven pop of the 1980s was decidedly lame in the flannel era (those two great early-90's bastions of taste, Beavis & Butthead, when coming across videos of "80s music," almost invariably made sounds of disgust before giving the inevitable verdict: "This sucks. Change it."). It wasn't until later in the decade that we realized we missed the sounds of our childhood and weren't in such a hurry to grow out of that stuff after all.
By now it's perhaps clichéd to reminisce over and to enjoy (with varying degrees of irony) the cheesiest of 80s music. It's been embraced everywhere, from VH-1 to YouTube to popular films (The Wedding Singer being one of the earliest examples that comes to mind; The Hangover, which features Mike Tyson listening enraptured to Phil Collins' AOR staple In The Air Tonight, is just the latest in a line of such references). We're truly living in a post-Rickroll age.
With 80s nostalgia a kind of cliché and darker angst seemingly reserved for hard rock and metal, what's a new indie rock band to do? Many go the "early R.E.M." route of mysterious lyrics and lo-fi production, wrapping the music in a kind of echoey haze. Music that seems to be about something and is vaguely earnest, but earnest about what you're not sure.
Bands like Passion Pit, usually burdened with the moniker "electro-pop," are following a different path. Using synthesizers and drum machines that either are, or are capable of replicating, the ones from 25 years ago (Yamaha's DX-7 is the most famous and most ubiquitous - with literally lots of "bells and whistles" and other bright sounds, this keyboard was used by pretty much any pop group from the mid-80s you can think to name), they're trying their best to write songs that suggest the past and its summoning of idealized childhood, while keeping things rooted in the present via modern production (both hi- and lo-fi) and, uh, mysterious lyrics. In effect, they are indie bands in retro-pop clothing. MGMT and Deastro are other examples, but on Manners, Passion Pit seems the most committed to the "good times" aesthetic. I think the Pitchfork reviewer compared listening to this album to remembering a great night out with friends, and it does have that character, even if the singer writes lyrics like, "That's a frosty way to speak/to tell me how to live next to your potpourri" and "Walls came crumbling/my thin skin trembling/with these salty wounds/my stolen gold inside the emperor's tomb."
Lyrics aside, this is not subtle music; it's more of a "wall-of-synths" experience. They go for the big and glorious choruses which, again, somehow feel like an idealized childhood where every wish is granted and magic is pretty much everywhere.
In other words, Manners is pretty much about fun and simple pleasures. And it's very consistent. All you have to do is check out the video for "The Reeling" and you'll get the vibe of the whole album. To quote Pitchfork again (because they are my betters, and one's betters must be respected and quoted often), "if you like one Passion Pit song, you'll probably like them all." I like 'em all.
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