FOALS - LIFE IS DUB
Life Is Yours, the first album from Oxford indie-rockers Foals as a trio, has been re-released and reimagined thanks to Dan Carey. Having worked with everyone from Kylie Minoque to Wet Leg, Carey has no problem taking 10 already engaging tracks from the indie-rock heavyweights and turning them into rich, multi-dimensional songs.
The band had been teasing the dub remix of their acclaimed album from 2022 since last summer, finally satisfying fans appetites for more of the record by dropping one of the tracks, ‘2am’ , in February. Now, fans old and new have to the opportunity to experience the acclaimed album in exciting new depth.
Opener ‘2am’ takes on a darker, rich quality as Yannis Philippakis’ vocals fight against the roaring bass and soaring instrumentals. ‘Under The Radar’ sparkles with melodic hooks, taking the track from sweaty festival grounds to dancehalls. Where Philippakis’ vocals usually take centre stage, they become secondary to the almost ethereal rhythm underpinning the reworked version of this track. Album stand out ‘2001’ morphs into an ‘80s inspired disco track, with the rattle of drums and synths making for a disorientating but thoroughly enjoyable listen.
The disco-house beats of the album’s title track, ‘Life Is Yours’, are elevated in Carey’s reworking. The track takes on a hallucinatory and rather hypnotic vibe, only growing in intensity until the final note is dropped. Carey’s creative direction enables more simple tracks like ‘The Sound’ and ‘Flutter’ to gain more depth and richness - making them the kind of songs listeners will come back to. ‘Crest of the Wave’ becomes a futuristic, riff-driven song - dragging the listener a manner of different directions in its duration.
‘Wake Me Up’ starts off softer than the original song, with layered vocals giving it a haunting edge (perhaps harking back to their two part album Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost, a darker, more rock sounding effort).
The final two songs of the album, ‘Looking High’ and ‘Wild Green’ burst with energy. The optimism and sense of urgency to get back into enjoying life again after the pandemic is heightened through the high impact, intense reworkings of these tracks.
From the beginning, Foals proved themselves as a band that are able to evoke something through their music (whether it be festival mosh pits or viral Twitter beef with another music heavyweight) and the reimagined tracks from Dan Carey emphasise this. It might prove a bit headache inducing at times, but Life Is Dub doesn’t stray too far from its source material - a delight to loyal fans and the new fans they’ll gain from this, for sure.
Jen Rose
★★★★☆