Last year, Samuel T. Herring lent his voice to one of the most memorable songs in Billy Woods and Kenny Seagal's masterful hit. maps. “I can't take you with me, but I'll be on your phone,” the Future Islands singer — also a rapper who wrote his own joint EP with Seagal — said. back to home, released in 2019 – on “FaceTime”, captures the essence of a song about the prevailing loneliness and strange comfort of life on the road. There is a kind of separation that the mind enacts in order to reconcile the two, which is reflected in Seagal's disoriented, hypnotic production. A lot of the latest records for Future Islands, People who aren't there anymorefor the first time since 2020 As long as you, digs into a similar headspace — having to stay strong for people far away, hold it together in a world that's falling apart, and save face — but the band's tight, taut brand of pop is designed to cling tightly to idealism. , not the fact of drowning. “Life is about imperfect bodies / And perfect voices,” Herring sings in “Peach.”
With their increasingly refined sound, Future Islands tend to bury flaws, but not longings, until it becomes clear they're feeding off each other. The record is about the disintegration of a romance that's not presented in any linear way, but Herring's framing feels deliberate once he introduces us to its early climax on the opener, “King of Sweden.” He's long ago given up on “the certainty of love,” he admits in “The Fight,” a song whose sentiments resonate with “FaceTime”: “Can I do this alone? Now I'm back in my cell/Back with myself/Waiting the phone.” But instead of backing down or accepting defeat, he decides to keep striving, even when cracks in the relationship begin to appear. On the more upbeat “The Thief,” he admits, “I know I'm gone/But I've been here the whole time/Hidden in the things you keep,” while “Deep in the Night” and “Say Goodbye” radiate sincerity. But it takes only so long that you can repeat the same cycle before you realize that you are stuck in limbo and losing yourself in the process; People who aren't there anymore It refers not only to those who leave for whatever reason, but to the version of you who actually left.
Although it does not directly record fading love, the album is energized by the push and pull of hope and despair ever-present in its orbit. Racing into the steady groove of “Peach,” a 2021 debut, Herring reaches for acceptance in an unforgiving world, a world he's quick to blame on the next track, “The Sickness.” By this point, though, he'd already faced the harsh truth on “Corner of My Eye,” the album's midpoint song set in the darkest of nights when you realize “everything could leave you, in the blink of an eye.” You can't pretend that “nothing's wrong” and “everything is a mystery” when he's staring you right in the face. “It's perfect, so it's done,” Herring sings. Which means it was, and it's time to move on.
Although it is full of singles that can easily be placed alongside their best, People who aren't there anymore It feels even more essential to make room for these moments of poignant clarity. Herring is an incredibly unique and emotional vocalist who can provide nuance by simply wrapping his verse around a song, but the richness and immediacy of the songwriting here speaks for itself; You'll feel like he's processing grief in real time, even if the songs have taken different forms over the years, and will continue to do so. “If you listen to other Future Islands songs, I'm singing about the long past, or maybe a past that's not so recent, but it's a reflection,” he said in a recent interview. “These songs were written in really emotional times, so there is still some reckoning and understanding to be gained.” The album rewards you for sticking with it, not least because the feelings never sound the same – and only then can you recognize which ones are worth holding on to.
