AI, Autotune, and Divorce: A Review of The Voidz Like All Before You
November 17, 2024
Kaitlyn Murphy, Secretary, The Campus
The Voidz are back with their signature indie-fusion sound. The six-piece band, led by Julian Casablancas of The Strokes, have released their third album Like All Before You, six years after their sophomore album Virtue, and a decade after their debut Tyranny. However, will this release maintain the sonic and artistic idiosyncrasies that have kept fans and indieheads waiting in anticipation for The Voidz’ return?
Receiving a 5.5 from Pitchfork, Like All Before You takes the listener on a journey through frontman Casablancas’ reckoning with lost love, life, and politics through an ambient, metal odyssey. Having defined their sound as “prison-jazz,” an amalgamation of all things new wave, old school hip-hop, secret jazz, and heavy metal, The Voidz have made clear their ability to subvert and defy genre, reveling in their own novel creation. Like All Before You develops this subversion that gives the band their flair, but fails to provide the pensive lyrics and sound that fans have become accustomed to with the past two releases.
The album has not been free from controversy, with fans, prior to its release, expressing frustration towards the band's use of AI in the creation of their album cover. Preceding the release of Like All Before You, fans were quick to notice the band's utilization of AI for their album cover. Backlash ensued quickly after the band posted the cover to Instagram, with fans expressing their disappointment. User @egetaktak on Instagram made their stance on the band's use of AI clear in their comment, stating, “I’m incredibly disappointed at your choice to use AI as the cover. The piece of art meant to reflect the artistry of an entire album being represented by soulless plagiarized AI production. Rather than having an artist express themselves in the style of your music, you’ve chosen to use something that steals from talented artists in an attempt to replace them and make a quick profit.”
In response, Casablancas attempted to ameliorate fans disappointment in a comment under the post from his personal account @minorbutmajor, telling fans how they have used “man made” art in the past, and how factors such as the price of art and cultural shifts have led to the bands decision to use AI. In his comment, Casablancas states, “...the artist wanted to charge $150,000. What is this 1988? we def didn’t go out of our way to use Ai art …” Casablancas continued, “Sorry to The Scared Of News Tools tribe, truly, sorry. But art plops up, best idea/image/noise/ in the end should win … and i’m not endorsing Ai, i don’t DWELL ON IT, but it’s part of culture now … Relax, it’s iphone.”
Despite the controversy, The Voidz managed to win fans back, playing shows at The Orpheum in Los Angeles, The Apollo Theatre in Harlem, and an additional performance at The Knockdown Center in Queens, the last of which sold out.
Like All You Before is a typical album by The Voidz, alternating between pillowy tracks like “Spectral Analysis,” to catchy synth-heavy 80’s inspired tunes like “Flexorcist,” to introspective indie-metal fusion tracks, such as “Prophecy of the Dragon.”
There is a sense of absence that plagues Like All Before You, not only in Casablancas’ lyrical yearning for a lost love, something that may be assigned to his somewhat recent divorce, but also in the heart of the album. The project ultimately lacks the direction of their former albums. Arielle Gordon of Pitchfork has also picked up on the slipshod nature of the album, stating in her review, that “...Casablancas details a questionably sincere quest for deeper meaning. Aiming for nirvana, he delivers a stream-of-consciousness slog instead.”
Like All Before You is written like a fever dream, something that has worked for The Voidz in the past, with songs such as “QYURRYUS” and “Nintendo Blood”. But with Like All Before You, The Voidz blur the line between sophisticated experimentation and sloppy pretentiousness. With lyrics such as “East Berlin, taste the f*cking decadence/ I used to be a lounge lizard/ Now look at me, I'm a wizard” from the song “Prophecy of the Dragon,” Casablancas overindulges in the ambivalence of his post-ironic lyrics (and excessive autotune), ultimately leaving listeners unsure of whether they should be laughing, scoffing, or theorizing.
Despite the aire of nonsensical pretension,"Like All Before You" succeeds in its display of Casablancas’s ability to be vulnerable with his audience. Perhaps it can be speculated that Casablancas is hiding behind the multiple layers of irony (or post-irony) which help to construct the album; maybe he is hoping that heavy autotune will take attention away from poignant, yet vulnerable, lyrics such as “Shape clay into a pot but its the emptiness is what you want/ I was a kid waiting for the band/ now I’mma [sic] the one in the white van” from the second track of the album “Square Wave.”
While The Voidz have established themselves as juggernauts of experimentation within the indie scene in the past ten years, Like All Before You falls short of the standard they set for themselves with 2014’s Tyranny and solidified with 2018’s Virtue; fans may have to wait a bit longer for the band to return to their headbanging, thought provoking, former glory.
Image from Cult Records
