Back to Records
On this page, I plan to post music reviews, but with the constraint of I have to write the review while listening to it. I'll put on a vinyl record, and write my review as the songs play, as I look at the album art and lyrics and tracklist. The record player is behind me as I listen, so I'm literally "back to records," heh. I'm of course alowed to edit after the fact, but the main meat of the review stays. Enjoy!
Monsters
by The Midnight (2020)
Needle down on Saturday, August 2, 2025 at 10:30 PM
BackgroundIt's hard to start with The Midnight's 2020 release Monsters when describing their work, which has at this point, spanned almost a decade, but it's their only album I have on vinyl. I grabbed it during one of the first Bandcamp Fridays back in 2020, to show my support for these guys. The duo, consisting of Tyler Lyle and Tim McEwan, are known for their synthwave sound and their homages to lost side of 80s culture and pop.
I remember discovering their first EP back in 2015, as it came up on my Spotify smart shuffle (back when it was good), but I never added or saved it, just kinda remembered what the album art looked like. But when their debut feature Endless Summer came out, it became an instant top ten album for me. (Should I make a top ten list on this site? I feel like it changes all the time, so I probably won't.) Since then, they've released a bunch more albums: Nocturnal in 2017, a spiritual successor to Endless Summer, and then Kids in 2018, a more sample-based and vaporwave-adjacent (I say this very cautiously) record covering the themes of childhood memories and wonder. This AlbumWith this album though, the kids have grown up, and the monsters are no longer constrained to the spare bedroom. There are many early 90s references throughout the music and art of this album. The entire album starts off with "America Online", the dial-up sound so familiar to folks surfing The Web of the 90s. The kids from their previous album have gained a few more years, prevalent in songs like "Seventeen" and "Prom Night". They are playing computer games like Ecco the Dolphin ("The Search for Ecco") and typing in "Helvetica". The room on the album cover seems to be taken straight out of that time period.
But with growing up comes the isolation. The album cover offers another major departure from the albums before it - it's lonely. It's not the setting of the mall, filled with arcade games, kids laughing, TV jingles. With that loneliness comes heartbreak, and what starts off with a promising first third quickly turns into a love gone cold with the pair of tracks "Fire in the Sky" and "Monsters".
From there, we are left with either pensive instrumentals or crooning ballads that highlight the loneliness, the act of searching and trying to find what was lost. Expressing slight hope that things will turn out right ("Brooklyn")? Trying to distract yourself from the dangers of isolation ("Deep Blue")? Begging to be taken back ("Night Skies")? Either way, we do end up on a positive note - "Last Train" offers a shimmer of hope, though its up to the listener. When the chorus sings "you missed the last train tonight", was it to have our two souls stay with one another? Or is it just a metaphor for a missing your last chance? Here's a hint as to what I think: the final lyric echos the first song, that is, "we are one beating heart."
Is Monsters my favorite record of The Midnight? No, the masterpiece Endless Summer still takes that throne. Would love to get that on vinyl someday. But Monsters a natural evolution of sound, style, and feeling for the band. They continue this evolution into their next album Heroes, which is probably my least favorite overvall, but it's still got great tracks. I look forward to their new album though, Syndicate, releasing October 2025, and based on the singles and album art, my guess is they are headed into cyberpunk and "dark synth" territory.
Okay, time to sleep.