Being Funny In a Foreign Language / The 1975 / October 14, 2022
- Joshua Yoo
- Oct 26, 2022
- 2 min read
Despite all the usual chaos of the The 1975’s artistic front, it seems that age, experience, and even family are ushering in a new direction for the well-established British band. At their self-proclaimed best, the group is certainly as sharp, concise, and cohesive as they’ve musically ever been, turning ‘Being Funny In a Foreign Language’ into a thoroughly enjoyable and essential centerpiece to their extensive body of work.
Unsurprisingly, The 1975 make a great musical pairing with Jack Antonoff on production, as they both work to compliment and harness their respective strengths with great focus. The album carries a pristine, glimmering aesthetic through its entire stay, pairing well with the throwback pop styles woven into tracks such as the gleeful “Happiness” or even more elated “I’m In Love With You”.
There’s a lot of classic synths, acoustic work, and bouncy drum patterns that have defined the classic The 1975 sound for quite a while, but even now they still manage to re-work them in new and fun ways, especially with their ever creative and sometimes eyebrow-raising lyricism (“Looking For Somebody (To Love)”). Matty Healy’s eccentric writing style will likely and understandably continue as a musical turn off for some, but there is some growth and charm in both content matter and phrasing of the songwriting here, opting for a more buoyant way of looking at things.
‘Being Funny In a Foreign Language’ feels like a great culmination of timing more than anything else, representing not just the current state of the band, but also the slight changes in the foundation for their future. The way they stick to their guns on this album should serve as a great blueprint.
Highlight(s): All I Need To Hear, Happiness, Oh Caroline, Looking For Somebody (To Love), Part of the Band, Wintering, I’m In Love With You
Lowlight(s): Human Too, About You
SCORE: 8/10
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