Three years ago, alternative rock band The 1975 graced the music industry and released their first self-titled studio album. Now, their fans have been gifted with their second record, “I Like It When You Sleep, For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It.”
The album dropped last Friday, Feb. 26, and has already skyrocketed to the No. 1 album position on iTunes. The long-awaited record features 17 songs with tracks including “Love Me,” “UGH!” and The Sound,” which have all received their video counterparts.
Band members include Matty Healy on vocals and guitar, Adam Hann on guitar and keyboard, George Daniel on drums and Ross MacDonald on bass guitar and keyboard.
The quartet formed 13 years ago in a town just south of Manchester, England and credits artists like Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones and Motown as influences.
The new album takes listeners on a journey of self-discovery. Through drug use, a longing to be loved, a break up and the death of a loved one, The 1975 hits you hard and heavy.
“When You Sleep” is all about “love, fear, death and sex,” frontman Matty Healy said in an interview with Vevo. “We wanted the record to be a bold statement about the fundamentals of being a person.”
The 1975’s new album is full of lyrical references to their past record. For example, in the song “Robbers” from their first album, Healy croons about a lover, “she had a face straight outta magazine.” On “When You Sleep,” Healy can be heard singing the same lyrics in “A Change of Heart,” but this time they have a different meaning. “You Used to Have a Face Straight Outta Magazine” — the song describes the stages of falling out of love with someone.
Similar to their first album, The 1975 has incorporated three interludes to break up the 17-track album. The title track, “I Like It When You Sleep, For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unware Of It,” is a 6.5-minute-long interlude with melancholy instrumentals.
Perhaps one of the most relatable songs on “When You Sleep” is “The Ballad of Me and My Brain.” The song starts off with a harmonizing chorus and slowly breaks into a twinkly pop-screamo mashup. Healy’s raspy voice slides between singing and half-screaming about how he has lost his brain. Lyrics like, “where would I be if I was my brain?” and “what a shame — you’ve lost a brain you never had” explain how we feel when we’ve exhausted all aspects of caring and begin to act impulsively and irrationally — when it seems that our heads couldn’t possibly be attached to our bodies anymore.
Frontman Healy included his most personal song yet on this album. Written for his late grandmother, “Nana,” illustrates what it is like losing a loved one. Healy sings, “I don’t like it, now you’re dead. It’s not the same when I scratch my own head.” For anyone who has lost someone close to them, they know that grief can be all-consuming. Healy’s interpretation wraps listeners into a calm and soft embrace, but explains, “If I live past 72, I hope I’m half as cool as you.”
The 1975 will embark on a world tour beginning March 3 at the O2 Academy Brixton in London. From there, the band will head to America and perform at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colorado May 2. Tickets can be purchased through axs.com.
“When You Sleep” is available now on iTunes through Dirty Hit Records.
