Future Islands

One Liner:  Indie synth pop band who apparently loves OMD

Wikipedia Genre: Synth-pop, alternative rock, indie pop
Home:  Greenville, NC

Poster Position: 5
Both Weekends.

Saturday at 4:20 on the Honda Stage.

Thoughts:  With them right next to Marc Ribillet on the menu, I figured for sure that this was the jokey ass band with Andy Samberg in it that did the "I'm on a Boat!" song that people still play when I get on a boat and they should stop.  But that is Lonely Island, not Future Islands.  Instead, this is a synth driven pop-rock band that makes me wonder if The National (or some other heart-on-sleeve current indie band) had been heavily influenced by The Cure.  They claim that Orchestral Manoeuveres in the Dark was "one of the biggest influences on the band."  Which is wild.  Other than something from an 80's movie soundtrack, I don't think I could name a single song of OMD.

Their Wikipedia creation myth is as weird an unintelligible as they come.  Here is a choice little nugget: 

The idea to form a band came while Cashion was helping Herring study for an art history exam. They invited local record shop personality Adam Beeby to play rhythmic keyboards and fellow art student Kymia Nawabi for percussion and backing vocals.  After a tumultuous debut on Valentine's Day February 14, 2003, at Soccer Moms' House, Herring also invited Welmers to join the band. Only Cashion and Welmers already played a musical instrument—the guitar—but Cashion took the bass and Welmers the keyboards, for a Kraftwerk-inspired sound.

Sam Herring played Locke Ernst-Frost, an arrogant narcissistic artist from Germany, Ohio, dressed in a 70s-inspired white suit with slicked-back hair, and a heavy German accent. The character's name originally was meant to be Oarlock Ernest Frost but it got shortened as a reference to John Locke, the religious poet; Max Ernst, the artist; and Robert Frost, the American poet.

The band quickly gained a local reputation and started touring the underground venues in the Southeast, playing shows with North Carolina acts like Valient Thorr and Baltimore artists such as Height, Videohippos, OCDJ, Nuclear Power Pants, Santa Dads, Ecstatic Sunshine, Blood Baby, Ponytail and electronic musician Dan Deacon whom they met during a show on May 26, 2004.

It's like someone wrote this to the actual band members, for their memories, and forgot to add in any sort of detail that would make these sentences make sense.  I can't decide which one of those terrible band names is the worst, but I'm just going to go with Blood Baby for the visceral reaction it brings to mind.

Six Albums - 2008's Wave Like Home, 2010's In Evening Air, 2011's On the Water, 2014's Singles, 2017's The Far Field, and 2020's As Long As You Are.  It is a lot of music, and I'm slightly fascinated that I've never heard a single one of these songs, ever, as far as I can recall.  A few have big streams counts, at least big for an indie synth band.  None of their first three albums charted, but then Singles was their biggest album in the US, making it up to #40.  Their next two made it to #52 and #108, respectively.  The power tune from Singles was "Seasons (Waiting on You)," which hit #27 on the U.S. charts in 2014, and has 85.7 million streams on Spotify.

The opening notes of that make me think of the Stranger Things intro song.  Then the synths and driving bass line kick in and the 80's spill in to the room ready to sing.  His voice goes Elton John at times in the chorus.  Funny thing is, at first, I didn't get much from this, but in the hours since, I keep singing the chorus to myself.  Catchy tune.

As I've plowed through a lot of these tunes, I'm not sure that I notice any major differences in the albums.  I don't see any major evolution in their sound.  Just seems like they keep adding more earnest synth pop action to their catalog.  I know this is about to be the same song, but from what I have read, this moment on Letterman was the killer moment that made them into sudden stars despite albums that hadn't been noticed.

I would not have reacted that way to that video.  His dancing is making me very uncomfortable, and the "I been waiting on you" part sounds more like a mad muppet took over the singing.  And that is before he goes full black metal singer near the end.  He's a good looking dude, and the backing band keeps a good groove, but nothing about this screams future mega-stars to me.  But Letterman sure liked it!  They have a live album that was recorded back then too, at SXSW, and I can't say that I love the vocals on there.  Lots of weird sounds going on.

Their second-most streamed is from that same album, but I'll give you one from the next disc just to mix it up.  This is "Ran," from 2017's The Far Field.  Just over 30 million streams.

They sure went for the literal with that video.  Made me think of the part in Ted Lasso where Ted starts running to see his son and Nate says that the run is a lot farther than he thinks, and Coach Beard says something to the effect of "it's a metaphor."  Another good tune though...

As for the band name - "The name is meant to be vague. ... We were either gonna be called Already Islands or Future Shoes. Because, seriously, you don't know what future shoes look like, but you know you'd want a pair! (you know?). So after deciding Already Shoes was a bad name, we combined them to Future Islands. That's the boring truth, sorry!"

I like "Balance" as well, which sometimes sounds like the Revivalists singer, bopping over the top of a Cure tune.  But "Thrill," from the new album, is absolutely not a thrill at all.  Nor is the Leonard Cohen-grumble of "Glada."  "The Happiness of Being Twice" sounds like a hellsong for a clownparty.

You know, even if I don't quite comprehend why they are on the 5th line of this poster, I think I'd enjoy this show more than the majority of the things I've heard so far for this year's fest.  I think the thing I like the most is the bassist.  Yes, it sounds like The Cure half the time, but I like the Cure.  So I'd probably go and check it out to expand my mind.  I mean, who doesn't like synths?!?!