Islands: Arm's Way : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

On their 2006 debut, this Montreal six-piece were like a pothead carnival of bloopy synths, African rhythms and pop-culture references. But on Arm's Way, gifted singer-songwriter Nick Thorburn broadens the band's quirk-pop into wonderfully shambolic arena rock — for an arena of 5,000 people. Guitars mingle with viola, clarinet and piano, hopping genres and tempos with an Of Montreal-style theatricality. "Pieces of You" begins with a gypsy bop, moves into a harmonic bridge worthy of Coldplay and locks into disco punk. The chirpy "Creeper" is about a fatal home break-in, and "In the Rushes" snatches from the Who's "A Quick One, While He's Away." But in these gloriously warped songs about murder and jail time, no one's all right: "Kids don't know shit," Thorburn yelps. "Everything we learned was wrong."