It\u2019s hard to believe this is only the Shins\u2019 fifth album. James Mercer has come back with a very different and eclectic album that many fans might be a bit puzzled by. To say the least, it\u2019s quite odd and a bit weird, but there\u2019s still some gems here, you just have to be willing to do the digging.<\/p>\n
Kicking things off, \u201cName For You\u201d is an upbeat pop song, the type that wouldn\u2019t sound out of place on pop radio stations currently playing Coldplay, the Chainsmokers or Lorde. \u201cPainting A Hole,\u201d on the other hand, is a great indie track, one of the most surprisingly good songs I\u2019ve heard in a while. It has the same type of energy as \u201cSimple Song\u201d and is just a nice toe tapper.<\/p>\n
About halfway through is when things start to go a bit sideways and make the average listener like myself a bit disconcerted. \u201cMildenhall\u201d is one of those weird electro songs that have been extremely popular lately. Maybe Mercer started making a Broken Bells record and then quit halfway through to make some more Shins and this got mixed in with the rest of the material. \u201cCherry Hearts\u201d is another techno wannabe track, sounding and feeling a bit like its leftover from around 1997, just very odd and off-putting. On the other hand, \u201cHalf A Million\u201d is a quirky-good little rocker that sounds like a synth track from 1982, back when pop music like this was at least acceptable.<\/p>\n
Mercer and company roar back to life on \u201cDead Alive,\u201d one of the few tracks here that feels like old Shins, just updated for a modern audience that may not remember \u201cNew Slang\u201d or \u201cPhantom Limb.\u201d The title track is another interesting little number but just isn\u2019t that exciting or rewarding and drags on a bit too long as well.<\/p>\n
Fortunately, they saved the best for last. \u201cThe Fear\u201d is really strong and a great way to end a record. The whole song feels very cool and mellow, the type of song great for the morning after a night on the town. As a whole, Heartworms<\/i> is woefully subpar, but there are great things here waiting to be discovered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":33062,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7690],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-44847","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-shins","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44847","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\/91"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44847"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}