Fantasy cover

Fantasy

M83

Released

Almost an unintentional companion piece to The Weeknd’s 2022 concept record Dawn FM, studio album number nine from unintentional hitmaker Anthony Gonzalez feels like a nostalgia-drenched run through an amazing eighties radio playlist that never quite existed — only in this case the dominant producer is Giorgio Moroder, not Quincy Jones (hard not to feel the wonder-evoking synthetic fantasy world landscapes of The Never-Ending Story in tunes like “Amnesia”), and instead of playing in your car it’s pushing through the static of a half-heard alarm clock radio speaker as you drift in and out of consciousness. A gauzy shoegaze-inspired mist covers the whole project. Whether it touches pastel-colored yacht rock (“Laura”) or the closest Gonzalez will probably get to poking the psychic scar of “Midnight City” (“Fantasy”), it keeps the mood dreamlike in a way only he can wrangle. Forty-odd vintage synthesizers went into the making of this somatic journey. They all got put to good use.

Jeff Treppel

Suggestions
Palo Santo cover

Palo Santo

Years & Years
Luminous cover

Luminous

The Horrors
Season High cover

Season High

Little Dragon
Ghostory cover

Ghostory

School of Seven Bells
Impersonator cover

Impersonator

Majical Cloudz
E•MO•TION cover

E•MO•TION

Carly Rae Jepsen
Anastasis cover

Anastasis

Dead Can Dance
Galaxy cover

Galaxy

Rockets
Dungeonesse cover

Dungeonesse

Dungeonesse