Albums and Abominations

By Benjamin Huber-Rodriguez     11/5/13 6:00pm

From Kanye West to Taylor Swift, Arcade Fire to Daft Punk, it seems the stars are aligned and all the big names in music have clamored to put out a record in 2013. With so many established artists topping the charts, debut albums from new bands can easily be lost in the shuffle. But the anticipation surrounding the debut album from Glasgow-based trio Chvrches has the Internet eagerly awaiting what comes next in the great canon that is synthpop, a newer genre based around electronic instruments and around utilizing many synthesizers and keyboards that change and adapt daily. That is a lot of pressure for a band that has only ever released five songs, but luckily for us, The Bones Of What You Believe does not disappoint.

So what does Chvrches do differently? Well, it is hard to say. The bombastic choruses of "Gun" and "By the Throat" embody the primal exuberance of Passion Pit. The bouncing keyboard riffs that rumble throughout "We Sink" and "Under the Tide" draw from electronic dance music and house music. Perhaps its strongest calling card is the emotive, pleading, crystal-clear voice of singer Lauren Mayberry.     

Mayberry's voice is compelling. There is a hint of voice modulation, but nowhere near full-on auto-tune a la Daft Punk. During quiet verses, such as the soft, building "Tether," she sings calmly and serenely, but when the songs break and the choruses drop, her voice swells with passion. Throughout the album, multi-instrumentalists Iain Cook and Martin Doherty successfully match the mood and degree of urgency in Mayberry's voice with the perfect back beats and synth riffs. 

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This constant back-and-forth between the production and Mayberry's voice drives Bones. But synthpop is nothing if not catchy and ridden with hooks, and on this front, Chvrches most definitely delivers. The high-pitched synth licks and shotgun drum beat make the chorus of "Gun" a high point, alongside the boy-girl back-and-forth during "By the Throat" and the slow, anthemic piano ballad meets outer-space tragedy on "You Caught the Light."

While The Bones of What You Believe is not necessarily a game changer and does not push boundaries in the traditional sense, it certainly raises the bar for debut albums. That a band could produce a collection of such clean, catchy and insistent tracks on its first professional attempt is a rare feat, and it is in those details that Chvrches does everything right. 

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