13 Songs That Flow

Young the Giant, the California alternative rock band, released their newest album, Mind Over Matter, on January 17th. The album is comprised of thirteen songs that are both engaging and soothing. The songs on this album are ones that you can easily hyper-focus on and work to dissect – both instrumentally and lyrically. However, at the same time the music isn’t so overpowering that you can’t do something else while listening to it. It’s the kind of album you could easily put on to have pleasant background music. Unlike their previous, self-titled album, Mind Over Matter plays around with some electronic sounds, which seems to be new to the band’s repertoire. Although, that being said, they still wouldn’t be seen as an electronic group. With this album they have found the proper balance of real instrumentation and electronic instrumentation.

Each song on the album plays an integral part of Mind Over Matter. The songs make sense together and flow well into each other. I will say that some of the songs sounds very similar, such as “Crystallized” and “Mind Over Matter.” They sound similar because they seem to follow very similar chord progressions. Yet, following these two tracks, the listener is given a reprieve of the (for lack of a better term) edgier tracks and can listen to the beautifully, haunting sound of “Firelight.” It begins with just an acoustic guitar that has a small touch of a Middle Eastern influence, but as the song progresses there are some nice airy samples and a little bit of soft synthesizer.

Overall, Mind Over Matter, is a very interesting listen. The songs have nice transitions and even the opening track, “Slow Drive,” entices the listener into the musical realm that Young the Giant seem to have created with this album. Young the Giant fans may be taken a little off guard because it is a bit different than their first album, but you will love it just as much.