{"id":42014,"date":"2010-06-17T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-06-17T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/manners\/"},"modified":"2010-06-17T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-06-17T00:00:00","slug":"manners","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/manners\/","title":{"rendered":"Manners"},"content":{"rendered":"

As penance for missing these indie darlings twice in the past two months (even a free concert! Free!), I\u2019m finally getting around to reviewing Passion Pit. Hailing from Cambridge, Massachusetts, this five-some has been quietly charting a path to danceable excellence since their first EP, 2007\u2019s Chunk Of Change. Manners, <\/i>which hit in 2009, is the group\u2019s first full length, though the clean sparkle of their sound belies their relative newness. I don\u2019t know why it took me so long to finally cotton to this album, though. I listened to \u201cEyes As Candles\u201d for a good three months before finally tracking down the disc it came from, and that tardiness most likely stemmed from the worry that nothing would measure up to the experience of \u201cEyes As Candles.\u201d <\/o:p><\/p>\n

This is one of those perfect songs that you fall madly, easily in love with on first listen and then never tire of, like an unexpected summer fling that manages to last. Singer Michael Angelako\u2019s vocals are engaging and unassumingly subtle, and paired with the shimmering synths and warm harmonies, this becomes an indelible listening experience. Meanwhile, the chorus, \u201cWhy do I always seem to need you when you\u2019re fleeing? \/ Where do you go when I\u2019m around? \/ What have I done, what have I lost that\u2019s so defeating? \/ And have the nerve to wear the crown?\u201d Simple, but it hits to the gut, and you barely even realize because it\u2019s all so pretty. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

And the rest of the material on this release is just as lovely and sparkling, from lead single \u201cTo Kingdom Come\u201d to the falsetto lull and joyous electro-pop of \u201cSleepyhead\u201d (initially featured on the Chunk Of Change <\/i>EP). Their songs are fully fleshed out but never lose the sense of sheer ecstasy and unabashed grooviness.\u00a0 Meanwhile, unexpectedly successful single \u201cThe Reeling\u201d is another hit, and the lyrics are worth a closer look under the swaths of synths and propulsive energy. \u201cLook at me, look at me, is this the way I\u2019ll always be?\u201d goes the chorus, the light frothiness of the vocals belying a real struggle to connect in a fractured world. \u201cI believe in gentle harmony \/ Well how I loathe all this obscenity,\u201d Angelako\u2019s ascertains, and it\u2019s this push-and-pull between a love of pure, colorful beauty and reality\u2019s foggier underbelly that lies at the heart of the album. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

It\u2019s refreshing to find music that just simply makes you happy without being as fluffy and disposable as cotton candy. Manners <\/i>can sometimes fall in love with its own giddiness (see penultimate cut \u201cLet Your Love Grow Tall\u201d which is a bit of a cheesy sing-along), but that\u2019s not a real fault, especially when paired with material like \u201cMoth\u2019s Wings\u201d and other singles that combine a fresh lightness with a heart, bones, and flesh. <\/o:p><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re cynical, there\u2019s probably only so much of this album that you\u2019ll be able to take, since there\u2019s not much variation among these eleven tracks. But if shimmer, sweetness, and substance are your thing, Passion Pit is worth taking a chance on. You won\u2019t be disappointed, and you\u2019ll definitely be cheered.<\/o:p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":30354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8587],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-42014","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-passion-pit","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42014"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}