On Feb. 14, The Lumineers released their highly anticipated fifth album “Automatic.”
After four successful albums, the general public may have thought that they knew what to expect of the Lumineers’ signature folk style, but “Automatic” deviated from their traditional tone.
The opener of the album “Same Old Song,” is an exhilarating first song with a strong beat and fast pace. This song’s tone, however, is misleading; when you take a moment to listen to the lyrics, the album is revealed to be reflective rather than upbeat.
When anticipating the public’s reception for their album, the band said, “People who think they have our number, they’ll be surprised.” Although the album sticks to their typical Americana folk-rock sound, the band is right. The tone and messages deviate from their old material.
The lead vocalist and songwriter of the band, Wesley Schultz, has said that the album is about reflecting on the absurdities of the modern world. There is a new maturity to “Automatic,” which is clear in the retrospectiveness of the lyrics, giving the album a nostalgia as the story takes you through a person’s realization that a relationship is unsalvageable.
After the lively track “Same Old Song,” the album moves in a slower, bitter direction. The next song titled “Asshole,” reflects upon a failed past relationship. This is followed by a 33-second break with “Strings,” a song of stringed instruments that crescendos and then weakens as we get to the title track “Automatic.” This song gets to the core of the album, calling out the faults of the modern world and our inability to live in the moment.
After this song, there is a shift. The narrator’s realizations about the faults in their past relationships and the world leads to introspection and longing for change. Encapsulating this is a moment in the song “Plasticine,” where the music cuts to a brief interlude. Only a quiet beat plays as a short audio clip from the movie “When Harry Met Sally” plays. “Maybe it just means that we should remember that we forgot them, or something,” Sally(Meg Ryan) says to Harry (Billy Crystal), “What does this song mean? My whole life I don’t know,” Harry responds. The listener is being challenged to listen closer and look within themselves. Ask what the songs are saying; ask what the songs are saying to you.
The second to last song is another emotional instrumental piece, setting up the last song “So Long.” This final song relies on complex metaphors, contrasting the more straightforward lyrics of the rest of the album, “Sit in isolation all the time/I’ll be on the ocean in your eyes/Tell it on the mountain he’s arrived/Everybody’s famous for a while/So long, so long.”
This album is edgier and more emotional, and if you listen closely, you’ll follow a story of the Lumineers’ design. Full of vivid imagery and confessional lyrics, “Automatic” may not be the energetic album with tracks that you want to sing and dance to like “Ho Hey,” “Stubborn Love” or “Ophelia,” but it may just be the track that listeners needed.
