If there’s a track that can have your heart beating with new vigour from electronic grooves, while making you contemplate current geopolitics and late-stage capitalism, it’s Gravité Fresq’s latest – ‘Future Is On Fire’.
The Dublin-based band paints a vivid, cinematic picture of intergalactic fight scenes done with an effervescent genre blend of alternative electronica, indie pop, and some 80s synth, creating a dark, resonant palette. The song delves straight to the point with the titular “the future’s on fire” theme, with the added prequel line “wake up grandpa” signalling how current decision-making by older generations has led to snowballing doom and an impending crash. The lyrics and melody are raw, piercing, and unforgiving.
The arrangement starts with a spectral neon and laser-light style of electronica, followed by the emergence of synths along with the vocals. The intensity, which is barely contained by the mix, only grows as they belt out lines like “louder screens and hotter weather”. Across the arrangement, the implosions of synth notes planted in and around the track only work to amp up the energy, bringing on gripping chorus hook lines. The track takes you through not just the surreal landscapes of the genre blend-verse, but also through the emotional cries of the generation inheriting the results of the past’s unchecked indulgence. The song overall captures the surreality of screaming into a void, but hearing the void screaming back at you.