Everything Everything - Raw Data Feel

Everything Everything’s decision to turn to AI to furnish their sixth album is less a desire to channel music’s leading experts in technological dystopia (Muse, this obviously means Muse), and more a studious exercise in digital découpé. But coming from a group whose lyrics usually land at around a 7 or 8 on the ‘zero to alt-J’ scale, who’d really be able to tell the difference? The Manchester indie stalwarts have made solid attempts at echoing their methods in the record’s sonic palette (opener ‘Teletype’ threatens to descend into ‘90s dial-up modem at any given moment), and it’s also a neat mechanism through which to allow producer/guitarist Alex Robertshaw to lean into ’80s synth territory with a mild stab at retrofuturism. Otherwise, it’s a largely hit-and-miss pop record. And the discord between this -arguably an attempt to join the swelling ranks of chart-busting nerdy boy UK pop stars - and the occasional peeking through of the album’s premise (‘Software Greatman’, ‘My Computer’, which ultimately suffer most from one of said acts, Bastille, having very recently released a whole record on a similar premise) - means ‘Raw Data Feel’ seems nearly as jumbled as what the band’s algorithm may have spat back at them first time around.