To Imagine EP- The Neighbourhood Review

Color!!! The band that released a mixtape called #000000 & #FFFFFF, the web codes for black and white, and has been all about black and white with every single thing they've done in black and white since day one (except for Honest, but that was from the Spiderman OST) has released an EP with pink, red, yellow, green and blue in its artwork, and numerous color images online! Granted, it wasn't a complete surprise. The Neighbourhood had released the Hard EP last year, shifting towards more of an eclectic indie rock sound, they did say they were changing a lot, and the singles for the EP did have splashes of color on them. Those singles were Scary Love and Stuck With Me, both which had a more electronic (but no less eclectic) sound than Hard, with the former already becoming a hit on alternative radio, a job it was made for.


Dust starts with a brooding, electronic bass beat, and launches straight from one of those melodic, almost cutesy little ear worm verses Jesse Rutherford does in to electronic shoegaze; this is the first time I've ever heard anything similar, no one else has mastered the art of electro-shoegaze, but no one's probably even thought of it before. The overall instrumentals are excellent, and the vocals are distorted and seem to float on top, matching the instrumentals perfectly. The lyrics also broach an excellent topic - life in the "platinum dust" after an apocalypse. The mix of vocals in this song and instrumentals comes together very well in an excellent harmony, starting the EP on a good foot. It continues on that foot through Scary Love, and dark, electronic pop tune with a driving beat and lyrics giving it the versatility to play on basically any radio station in the US except Jazz and classical; a bit like a The Neighbourhood "Thunder", but without the outright meme quality. Heaven and Compass both match suave beats with Jesse Rutherford's yearning but still cool vocals, and electronics and keyboards(and maybe a guitar?!) that seem to float above all the bass in a haze of treble. I think Compass should've been mixed better, with the guitar taking the forefront, and an overall more natural sound, which would've been excellent. Stuck With Me ends the EP with a bit of a summary of the tracks that came before it: a driving beat, lot of bass, keyboard very high in the treble range, and slick but also yearning vocals from Rutherford.

I think it was smart for them to release To Imagine separately from Hard instead of all together as Hard To Imagine, because they don't really fit together. Hard has more of a modern Indie Rock feel, while To Imagine is alot more electronic. I hope that they head in more of a real instrument direction, as the electronics they'd been dabbling heavily in earlier were getting them nowhere. Dust was probably the best song on this EP, with no real worst. I hope that The Neighbourhood releases more music soon after this, because I feel like these two random EPs need a summation, a validation that could only come in the form of an EP. In the mean time, I have to decide - do I want to go to their Connecticut or Albany concerts? Neither is very convenient, but I would definitely want to go to at least one.