M83's "Hurry Up, We're Dreaming" was universally lauded upon its release and ended up landing all the way at number three on Pitchfork's "Top Albums Of 2011." Of course, as a bubbling synth-pop record steeped in infantilism, it was tailor-made for the P4K generation. For anyone born before 1980 who had to actually live through that shitty decade consciously, it reeked of idealized nostalgia of the worst kind. It isn't just that synth-pop, with a few exceptions, was one of the enemies that American hardcore and punk rallied against during that overly romanticized decade, it is that M83's Anthony Gonzalez, who appears to be of adult age, can't seem to leave an idealized vision of youth and that decade behind. This was all sort of cute a few years ago, when pretty much everyone was making this sort of album, but it's tired now. Seriously, it's time to grow the fuck up and stop sucking your thumb. Why this record is somehow being recognized as anything other than just another synth-pop record in love with the 80's is beyond me. To make matters worse, it isn't even that good. It's somehow cheesier than even the cheesiest 80's songs. Yet this is not irony, Gonzalez sounds like he sincerely means all two hours and twenty minutes of this atrocity. I guess because of that sincerity and because of its "epic" nature, he has convinced a lot of people that this is an important work. I am clearly not one of them. "Midnight City" (which, by the way, is the one song I can actually stomach)
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