Imagine Dragons
Evolve

THE REVIEW

I am about to write this review with a bitter taste for a band that could have been something important but instead failed to deliver on the promises of their first album, released in 2012: "Night Visions," which managed, despite some songs being a bit too pop and radio-friendly, to become a notable work in the field of Indie Rock. Then, three years later, "Smoke and Mirrors," so much smoke, indeed, and very little, really little roast; right away it seemed like the manifesto of the aspiring alt-rock band that sells out to continue gaining notoriety in the Indie world, by now merely a sub-genre of chart-topping electropop. And, as if that weren't enough, Imagine Dragons collaborated with artists light years away from their style, like Wiz Khalifa in "Suckers For Pain." And here is "Evolve," five years after the debut album, completing the pop-omelet, an album without soul, just little songs made to stick in your head and be hummed every 2 minutes, a "torment" (musically speaking, lasting 11 songs!) for those who have followed them from the beginning. The only bright side left is Dan Reynolds’ powerful voice that fits well into a sea of synthesizers and automations.

Ultimately, a very simple pop band that has decided to follow in the footsteps of other highly successful pop bands (see One Republic) that pose as rock but have absolutely nothing of rock except for a few guitar licks that occasionally pop up, copied from here and there (in "Walking The Wire," for example, they bring back U2).

What can I say, this album, in my view, should be called "Regress," like the journey of Imagine Dragons so far, but as long as we are criticizing this ice cream cone advertisement album, there will be someone somewhere in the world downloading the exotic "Thunder" or "Believer," the unsuccessful clone of "Radioactive," who will put these tracks at the top of their playlist or even purchase the album, claiming it to be yet another masterpiece from a band that has matured and represents the best of contemporary Indie.

The symbol-track of the album is "Whatever It Takes," a very banal and depressed electronic ballad that we will hear playing on the radio countless times this summer.