Photo by Kathryn Yu
Last year, writer Dan Brooks coined the phrase “egg manning,” which he described as “the practice of finding a terrible argument from an unknown Twitter user in order to disagree with it.” The awareness of this tactic should be enough to render 90% of internet think pieces immediately irrelevant, but here’s the thing: There are people out there who are mad about LCD Soundsystem reuniting, I swear. Not mad enough to occupy the headquarters of a federal wildlife reserve, but mad enough to say they’re done with the band forever.
James Murphy was surprised by this reaction. He’d expected the cynical response—l**ook at these fuckin’ guys—but hadn’t anticipated the more present, wounded response from fans aghast at the seemingly casual decision to cash in on retirement by playing Coachella, that bastion of rich kids and their #vscocam filters. "if you cared a lot about our band, and you put a lot of yourself into that moment (or anything about us you chose), and you feel betrayed now, then i completely understand that,” he wrote. “it’s your right to define what you love about a band, and it’s your right to decry their actions and words as you see fit, because it’s you, frankly, who have done much of the work to sustain that relationship, not the band.”
-=-=-=-There’s no reason to doubt the depth of Murphy’s sincerity, but I was taken aback by how hard he fell on his sword, apologizing for the cardinal sin of wanting to make music with his friends, and get paid an absurdly large amount to do so. Maybe it’s sort of gauche to have made such a big deal out of breaking up—there was the Madison Square Garden blowout, and subsequent documentaries and box sets diagramming that blowoff—only to reunite within the same presidency, but whatever. Most reunions are done with tangible pleasures in mind, like making music with your friends, and getting paid an absurdly large amount to do so.
Holding a grudge against the inevitable reality of broken-up bands getting back together is a losing battle. It never bothered me to begin with: I came of age in the early aughts right as all the alt bands of yesteryear—Pixies, Dinosaur Jr., Mission of Burma, and so forth—were reforming, surely disappointing the aged heads whose memories dated back to when Black Francis had hair. But I wanted to see these reformed bands, and I did, no matter that they weren’t possibly as good as they were "back in the day." Who cares about history when the present is right in front of you?
There are presumably thousands of LCD fans who never saw the band when they were together. This is what happens when a band like LCD is so valorized for their artistic achievement: The next generations want to check it out. Sure, it’s great if you were there… but it’s fine for everyone who wasn’t to want to catch up. (Besides, it’s fitting that James Murphy wouldn’t do the “cool” thing by remaining a warm memory accessible only to a few—despite being the living personification of Brooklyn hip, he disavowed that hipness whenever given the opportunity and made it clear he was just a music geek.)
As for the cynical response Murphy was expecting: It’s easy to clown on LCD for all their outward pretensions, and the waves of adulation they received during their brief career. They attracted lots of accolades from music critics for their brand of “I’m the saddest dad at the rave” rock, partly because music critics are a bunch of sad dads (sad moms, too, but it’s fun to rhyme). This website alone ran a very in-depth feature on their music about the length of Ulysses. The perception they were making music for aging hipsters refusing to let go has only been accentuated by Murphy's post-band career, in which he's scored multiple Noah Baumbach movies and opened up a trendy Brooklyn wine bar.
But let’s not get it twisted: LCD Soundsystem were very, very good, and worthy of most of that praise. No other 21st century band did a better job at synthesizing decades of music history into a sound that wasn’t crass, overt, or obscure. Murphy was both knowingly ironic and unapologetically sentimental, a cyborg built from the best bits of Stephen Malkmus and Billy Corgan. LCD made music to be gloomy to in your bedroom, and music that launched you onto the dance floor like some post-molly monster, motivating smart asses to loosen up and feel less self-conscious about recognizing the emotions dislodged by the passing of time.
Though LCD predated the EDM surge, and aren’t as associated with the movement as other indie-adjacent dance act like Justice, they’re not too far off. You can trace a throughline from, say, “All My Friends” to modern EDM standards like “Clarity,” blissful emotion imbued in a rippling dance groove. That’s why they’re going to go over strong at Coachella, despite the hesitation of critics who think indie legacy = baaaad in 2016. Imagine the drugged-out teens, ready to cry it out in the arms of their besties, a new collection of euphoric LCD Soundsystem experiences manifested for people to tell their friends and kids about. From there, they’ll tour again, and release a new record before the end of the year. There are no reasons to think it won’t go well.
As Murphy noted, fans disappointed by the violation of their sanctified feelings need not participate. There’s a lot of music out there; there’s a lot of life out there, and it is stunningly simple to avoid paying attention to a moderately popular band from an indie label. It’s not like they’ll pop up at the Super Bowl to play with Coldplay. But I would bet several paychecks those reservations will vanish once the new record drops, or when those hesitant fans are Four Loko drunk at a festival when the opening piano riff to “All My Friends” kicks up. Pardon the convenient kicker, but: That’s how it starts.
