M83: "Midnight City"

Anthony Gonzalez’s grandiose field of vision, which ambitiously seeks to invest every dramatic notion into some manic, emotional tapestry, tends to diminish his catalog as often as expanding it. Note that this critique applies strictly to Gonzalez—not M83 as a whole—since we didn’t have to adapt to awkward monologues (“Car Crash Terror,” “Graveyard Girl”) or is-he-serious vocal hooks (“Up!”, “Farewell/Goodbye”) when Nicolas Fromageau was still in the band. Yes, M83 has broadened both its approach and fanbase since Fromageau’s departure and Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts (2003), but Gonzalez, even at his focused prime, can’t seem to shake the proclivity to go EPIC. Go ahead and cue “Midnight Souls Still Remain,” that eleven-minute sleepwalk of overlapping tones that managed to close Saturdays = Youth (2008) on the limpest note possible.

Three years on and the sleek caress of midnight inspires M83 again with “Midnight City,” the first cut taken from October’s unsurprisingly epic-sounding double album Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming. Besides its hook—what sounds like either a coked-up synth line or a digitally tweaked horn—“Midnight City” thrives on the same decadent synths and airy vocals that measured so much latent magic out of Saturdays = Youth. Even when enunciated in expertly layered coos, Gonzalez’s night-drive inspired lyrics incite exclamation marks worthy of a Robert Smith notebook (i.e. “The city is my church!”) while drum-machine fills echo in a chasm borne of towering metropolis walls. Although “Midnight City” could be interpreted as a patient retread of “Don’t Save Us From the Flames” with far less brain fragments, the single ultimately delivers another dream-pop playground in the same caliber as “Kim & Jessie.”

With that double album waiting in the wings, you can rest assured that we’ll meet head-on with a clunking Gonzalez composition, full of cymbal-crashing progressions and imploding orchestras, before the year’s through. In the meantime, enjoy “Midnight City” for all of the trademarked pleasures we’ve come to love M83 for: wistful vocals, rich electronic instrumentation, unwaveringly thick hooks, and (surprise) a pretty sick saxophone solo at the end. And at a purposeful four-minutes, this single’s greatest strength is its refusal to grow enormous for enormity’s sake.