Dreamers, believers, lovers, life-leaders: Future Islands has an experience in store for you tonight at 8:30 p.m.
With soaring synthesizer melodies and grounded, zealous vocals, Future Islands will not take the Bishop stage tonight—they’ll seize it, like the daze. The new wave dance band, originating in North Carolina but now residing in Baltimore, has not put out an album since 2011’s “On the Water”. However, they continue to send ripples through hearts, choosing Bloomington as one of just 13 shows in a one month tour through the US and Canada.
Audiences are enchanted by the steady groove of the bass and drum pad, and charmed by the synthesizer melody, which is mysteriously melancholic and euphoric at the same time. And somehow this synthetic noise comes to sound like the voice of nature. Listen to the intro of “Close to None,” and you’ll hear the rain, the leaves, the sunrise, and the sea; the clouds passing and blades of grass blowing in the wind.
And then vocalist Sam Herring chimes in—seemingly disillusioned and hypnotized—spitting surreal vocabulary, letting those words flow like he may just collapse if they don’t come out.
These words deliver testimonies of love and loss, an overcast ultimately defeated by sunny skies. The essence can be anything from passionately sorrowful to eloquently elated, but it remains utmost honest with every beat. Through these songs he tells stories, and he reaches out to you. He’s a father, a best friend, or a hero with all the perfect words—advice most profound. He tells the best bedtime stories, as the sweet, floating melodies put you to peaceful rest.
Here, the dreaming kicks in, though it’s hard to tell if you were ever awake. In this land of mystic message, Herring dejects regret. His tender voice casts a spell of content over us as he leads us to see vitality in both the beauty and the breakdown.
purchase tickets for only $12 here: http://www.spiritof68promotions.com/event/382095-future-islands-bloomington/
buy their discography here: http://future-islands.com/
