Album Review: Postiljonen- Skyer

There are times when I’m never really quite sure how long these pieces are supposed to be. I try to say a lot about albums that I like, or at least can find some redeeming qualities in. Sometimes, I probably say a little too much. Sometimes, I may even say a little too much about albums that I don’t like.

But really, these don’t have to be any specific length. Legit music magazines have sections where reviews are “50 Words or Less,” meaning a staff member read the PR blurb they were sent and listened to the 90 second samples in the iTunes store, and then wrote down the first 50 words that came to mind.

I at least listen to these records.

It’s hard for me to imagine that a band so contemporary would begin influencing the sound of others. But so is the case of the French electronic outfit M83, and Swedish newcomers Postiljonen. Their debut LP, Skyer, owes pretty much everything to M83’s gigantic, cinematic, grandiose emotional electronic sound. In fact, it seems like within the first three tracks—the obligatory “Intro,” the synth heavy slow jam “Help,” and “We Raise Our Hearts”—the band just listened to copies of M83’s Saturdays=Youth, and Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, and then asked themselves, “Well, how can we try to make something that sounds exactly like this?”

If that’s what they set out to do, then they’ve successfully met their goal. Skyer is the best M83 album released this year.

All jokes aside, this album isn’t terrible. But it’s not groundbreaking or interesting. There’s a real lack of emotional depth to the material, and it becomes very easy to kind of tune it all out, only every so often thinking, “Oh hey there’s an 80’s sounding keyboard and a cool reverby electronic drum kit.” It’s also a sound that you’ve heard before—probably in the 1980’s, when keyboards all sounded that way and reverby electronic drum kits were a new thing. Like on “On The Run,” it’s so derivative of an entire decade of music, it’s difficult to say which song it’s not trying to copy.

Occasionally, Skyer crashes right into the chilliest of waves—the basis of “Supreme” sounds like something Toro Y Moi or Washed Out would have maybe created four years ago.

As the album closes, things get a little laughable, if you’re familiar at all with M83’s rather popular single from 2011, “Midnight City,” a song that ends with a pretty bitchin sax solo. Wearing their influence proudly on their sleeve, Postiljonen pull out not one but TWO songs that feature the sax—“All That We Had is Lost,” and the final track, “Atlantis.”

I went into this album knowing absolutely nothing about this band, or their sound. I saw it getting some praise online and though, “Oh sure, I’ll take a look at it.” Skyer is like a big-budget summer action movie—you think it’s a new idea, but it isn’t. You’ve seen it a million times before, and it just becomes mindless entertainment.

If you must, Skyer is available via Best Fit Recordings.