I was a little (okay, a lot) late to the party with this one, the debut from Las Vegas arena rockers Imagine Dragons, which dropped in September. But in the case of good albums, it\u2019s better late than never, right? I initially wrote them off because lead single \u201cIt\u2019s Time\u201d \u2013 despite being a solid slice of jangly pop with a deceptively dark undercurrent \u2013 blurred together with so much of the palatable pop rock singles that light up the radio for a quick second. But then came second single \u201cRadioactive,\u201d which immediately grabbed my attention (which is hard to do these days, as the amount of reading in grad school has ensured that I listen to a lot of library-silence instead of cool new music). <\/p>\n
But back to \u201cRadioactive:\u201d it\u2019s a potent combination of stomping stabs of drums, shimmering guitars, and vocalist Dan Reynolds\u2019 commanding performance on this apocalyptic, strangely stunning opening track. It gives the sense that Imagine Dragons, for all their pop sensibility, have some substance to them, too. There\u2019s an edge, an undercurrent of despair that sets Imagine Dragons apart from, say, a band like OneRepublic, who has a similar pop sensibility and ability to craft stick-in-your-head singles but without the staying power.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
For instance, tracks like \u201cBleeding Out\u201d and \u201cDemons,\u201d though buoyed by the sheer, expansive beauty of the instrumentation, are lyrically quite dark. \u201cNo matter what we breed \/ We are still made of greed\u2026Don\u2019t get too close \/ It\u2019s dark inside \/ It\u2019s where my demons hide,\u201d Reynolds croons, and it\u2019s only on repeated listens that you realize that \u201cDemons\u201d is half love song, half warning sign. Moments like these give Night Visions <\/i>its depth and dimension, making for a captivating release all the way through.<\/p>\n
This is a pop album at its core, albeit a diverse array of catchy, feel-good songs designed to captivate stadiums. I can imagine almost every song on Night Visions <\/i>being a single, from the driving power pop of \u201cTiptoe\u201d to the hand-clapping, uplifting jauntiness of \u201cOn Top Of The World.\u201d Every chorus here demands to be sung along to. <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the cohesiveness of the album belies the fact that the band experienced a lineup overhaul before being signed to Interscope Records in 2011; the original members released three EPs before bringing in current drummer Daniel Platzman to play with Reynolds, guitarist Wayne Sermon, and bassist Ben McKee. Almost immediately, lightning struck with \u201cIt\u2019s Time,\u201d which hit #15 on the Billboard charts, with the album not following far behind. Night Visions <\/i>made quick work of selling 83,000 copies, reaching #2 on the charts \u2013 the highest debut for a rock album since 2006.<\/p>\n
And it only takes a couple of spins of this disc to see why. Every song here brings something captivating to the table, whether it\u2019s doing the Killers one better on the soaring \u201cHear Me\u201d or the nine minute odyssey of \u201cNothing Left To Say\/Rocks,\u201d which is a textured, driving anthem. Meanwhile, \u201cAmsterdam\u201d is another favorite, an excellent amalgamation of Reynolds\u2019 alluring vocals, a propulsive interplay between the bassline and the guitar, and the slow-burning chorus: \u201cYour time will come if you wait for it \/ It\u2019s hard, believe me, I\u2019ve tried.\u201d It\u2019s also one of those cuts where you know there\u2019s a rich backstory, because it closes out with the haunting line, \u201cBut I won\u2019t wait much longer \/ \u2018Cause these walls they\u2019re crashing down \/ And I keep coming up short.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s these instances \u2013 the indelible combination of evocative lyrics and layered, pop-oriented instrumentation \u2013 that make Night Visions <\/i>so resonant. It\u2019s stylish and sweet at times, but it\u2019s also strangely haunting in a way that sticks with you. This is not just a promising debut but a strong release in general, and I can only imagine that these songs are even better in a live setting \u2013 so check Imagine Dragons out if they\u2019re in your city! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":31424,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9107],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-43126","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-imagine-dragons","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/43126","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=43126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/43126\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=43126"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=43126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}