Phantom Planet – Raise the Dead Review
Yes, Phantom Planet. The same band that infamously brought us the theme to teen drama obsession the O.C. came back last spring with a somewhat different kind of album. It’s evident that at some point in the last couple years the band sat down and decided they wanted to be taken a little more seriously. So if for some twisted reason you’re waiting out another “California”, you may be severely disappointed after listening to this album.
Borrowing heavily from the Strokes with several nods to Radiohead, Raise the Dead is a fun, powerful record, and one of the biggest surprises of last year. Leading on its best foot, the album opened with the cathartic title track, arguably an instant classic. Their maturity shows with songs like Dropped and Demon Daughters, with their sound taking on darker, more sinister, and complex character. Much of the album has a dance vibe and is poppy, but never without a sense of finesse and never compromising the overall creativity. Throughout the album they experiment with sounds and rhythms and Alex Greenwald proves that he is not only a strong, but versatile vocalist.
The album centers around the concept of a cult, which could be one of its greatest strengths but a weakness as well. While it’s refreshing at first to get such bizarre and dark lyrics, particuarly when the sound is mostly bright, it does get a little old after a while. Of course, if you’re in a cult, then I suppose you could always relate to this album, and surely there is some metaphorical way to extract meaning from this album from one listen to the next.
Luckily, even though the album features some experimentation and relies somewhat on its grandeur, it doesn’t suffer from what I like to call “shock and awe” syndrome. In other words, the songwriting is strong as hell, and will allow you not only to be impressed on the first listen but can grow on listeners with time.
Of course some people will see the album as contrived, cheesy, or worse, a ripoff of the Strokes. To that I would argue that Phantom Planet managed to carve their own signature into this album, and should the band choose to continue after this hiatus, they may continue to disassociate themselves from the overhyped T.V. show that brought them to fame.
Phantom Planet – Raise the Dead
Phantom Planet – Geronimo
Tags: album
