Beyond the black mirrors
Yes, I went to see Arcade Fire. With Feist, LCohen, Aziz, Huma, Zevon, Drake and others on my mind.
Yes, I went to see Arcade Fire. It’s complicated. As is life. Life beyond the black mirrors.
This will not be a hot take. It will be a long take. This is what’s been rattling around my brain for the past three months, illustrated by what I went to see last week.
Arcade Fire has been the defining musical act of my personal and professional adult life, for myriad reasons. I love the new album. I’d bought tickets months ago. As the date approached, I didn’t necessarily want to be there. And I didn’t know how to feel about the fact that I didn’t necessarily want to be there.
Who was going to be there? Some angry fans were demanding refunds from Ticketmaster, people who trusted the band that once sang, “Put Your Money on Me.” And now I had Nardwuar’s voice in my head singing “Half-Empty Halls.”
This summer’s news about how Win Butler “lived [his] misbehaviour” was shocking. Awful. Gross. I feel terrible for people who felt manipulated, harassed, used and exploited. There are accusations and denials, but there remain things Win admitted to and got caught doing, things for which there is a trail of digital evidence provided to a reporter and Condé Nast lawyers. Keep it down now, voices carry. These days, so do dick pics.
I also felt terrible for people in the band, and the collateral damage to others whose professional careers and reputations are inextricably linked to the name Arcade Fire. I’ve had lots of long conversations with many people about this in the past three months. With many people who feel betrayed.
And also with women in their 40s and 50s—women old enough to wish a dick pic still meant a Grateful Dead bootleg—who shrugged and told me: “Honey, that’s just men.” What do you expect?
I saw the band play at Osheaga in Montreal this summer, shortly before the allegations broke. It remains a fantastic memory for many reasons. That could have been my final memory of the band. Why soil it?
I was there close to the band’s very beginning. If this was going to be some kind of end, I wanted to bear witness.
We know that it’s time to go / heard the news on the radio /
one last round before we go /
through the pale atmospheric glow / and the oxygen’s getting low /
sing a song that we used to know /
one last round before we go
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Thursday, December 1. The previous show was in Edmonton, four days earlier. The crew’s trucks got stuck in a Prairie snowstorm, and didn’t arrive in Toronto until a few hours before doors. The band was getting ready to play a stripped-down set on rented gear. Door times were pushed. Then came news that a key collaborator of recent years had suffered a brain aneurysm and died. As if this tour wasn’t stressful enough already.
Upon arriving, there are no noticeably weird vibes. No protests outside. No desperate scalpers. The crowd is all-ages and mixed gender—this isn’t a sausage party of Louis CK fans. Arcade Fire is a massively successful pop band; their current audience likely doesn’t consume a lot of music news. This isn’t Twitter. This is life offline.
There is next to no one there to see Boukman Eksperyans, the premier Haitian band of the last 30 years, but that’s hardly surprising. Frankly, if Beck was still on the bill, even he would be playing to people filtering in. An opening act is an opening act, period, and I long ago resolved never to go to a huge show just for the opener. Normally I’d be super excited to see Boukman Eksperyans, but not tonight. Not in this context.
We can make it if you just don’t quit on me / I won’t quit on you / Don’t quit on me.
That’s the chorus of the first song Arcade Fire plays on that first Toronto night. Since the news I hadn’t listened to the new album—or any Arcade Fire—so that line is jarring, to say the least. That’s followed by “Keep the Car Running,” a song about paranoia, about “a fear I keep so deep,” about being prepared for quick escapes.
The music is great: I don’t need to remind you this has always been a powerful live band. If anyone on stage was just punching the clock at this tumultuous point in their history, it is not at all evident. This is a family, but this is not a funeral. But speaking of Funeral, we then get “Tunnels,” a song that will never not give me chills (the good kind). Then “Power Out.” Great song. Positive message. Ostensibly, so is perennial crowd-pleaser “Rebellion” — though it’s odd tonight to watch Win sing about lies, lies, lies, every time you close your eyes, about hiding your lovers underneath the covers, and then mysteriously ends the song repeating, “Shame, shame, shame.” (That’s not normally part of the song.) Huh. Then “No Cars Go”—can’t go wrong. Then “Age of Anxiety,” one of the best songs on the new album, that lands a bit differently now:
It’s the age of doubt / and I doubt we’ll figure it out…
When I look at you / I see what you want me to /
When you look at me / you see what I want you to see
And then a beloved classic that goes a little something like this:
I guess I’ll just begin again / You say, ‘Can we still be friends?’ …
All the kids have always known/ that the emperor wears no clothes / but they bow down to him anyway / because it’s better than being alone…
Some lines in that same song echo around the empty seats in the house:
I would rather be alone / than pretend I feel alright…
I would rather be wrong / than live in the shadows of your song
In what appears to be a spontaneous set decision, the band then launches into “Rococo,” a disdainful song about “the modern kids” who “build it up just to burn it back down.” The song isn’t about being pitchforked by Pitchfork, but it sure seems like it. Then we get to one of my all-time favourites, the song that asks:
“When love is gone, where does it go? / And after this / can we last another night?”
Win is roving in the audience for “Afterlife,” as he has been a couple of times during the set. Not unusual for him. Normally I love gestures like this, cheezy as they are. Fourth wall and all that. But now? Uh, no thanks. People are still excited to be close to the lead singer. To which I think: really? I’m at this particular show at this moment in time to see the band, to hear the songs. I’m definitely not here to get close to Win Butler. But adulation and fame sure are weird, for performer and audience alike. The fact he’s getting up close and personal during this song, rolling around on the floor singing, “Can we work it out? / We scream and shout ’til we work it out”—it’s like he’s practically begging us for forgiveness.
Then comes “Reflektor,” in which the narrator talks of falling in love “when I was 19 and I was staring at a screen.” Oh, man, you’re not making this easy. But that’s nothing compared to what’s next, the one Arcade Fire hit I was least expecting to hear tonight, the one I was least hoping to hear tonight: “Creature Comfort.” You know, the one about suicidal young girls you meet on the Internet:
“Some girls hate their bodies / stand in the mirror and wait for the feedback…
Assisted suicide / she dreams about dying all the time / she told me she came so close / filled up the bathtub and put on our first record”
That song came out in 2017, which was when Win now admits he was sexting young (adult) women who loved his band. I can’t believe this song is on a 2022 set list. But it was a big radio hit. The crowd seems to love it; I don’t see any screwface. It’s the single most uncomfortable moment of the night for me. On the next song—another good new one, “Rabbit Hole”—Win sings, “Somebody delete me.”
That seems somewhat possible when Régine takes a star turn on “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains),” at the end of which she’s joined onstage by dancing members of Boukman Eksperyans, including the parents of new auxiliary Arcade Fire member Paul Beaubrun (the dreadlocked guy with Will Butler-esque antics).
After the song, Win points out the parental connection to Boukman, then says something to the effect of, “How cool is that? Or, I don’t know, maybe it’s fucked up to tour with your parents. We’re all fucked up in some way. I know I am [ed: emphasis mine]. This next song is for anyone whose parents weren’t perfect.” The song is called “Unconditional.”
“Things will break / you make mistakes / You lose your friends / again and again / Coz nothing is ever perfect / no one’s perfect / let me say it again: no one’s perfect.”
Tell me about it! The set closes with “Everything Now,” dedicated to a friend who worked on the song, a friend the band believed to have died earlier that day. Win urges the crowd to dance for the departed. (Turns out the person survived, but is still on life support.) They hardly need prodding: people love this song. It was the band’s first No. 1 hit. Older fans and indie snobs hate this song—they think it was the beginning of the end of Arcade Fire. But it’s massively popular in the real world. It’s a fitting set-ender. It brings the dichotomy to life. If you hated “Everything Now” in 2017, you probably weren’t at this show. If you liked it, you probably were.
Then the encore. Judging by the crowd noise, I wouldn’t say it was the most deserved encore I’ve ever seen. People did love the set: I saw a lot of joy, a lot of dancing, a lot of singing. It was full of bangers, with “Rococo” being the only wild card. But when it’s over, there’s a sense of satiation, like, “I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be here and that was way better than I expected.” I think people are ready to go home—also, it’s late, after 11 p.m., because of the delayed start time. The band returns and then launches into a curveball: the four-part “End of Empire” suite from the new album. It’s played very well, and doesn’t flop, but it’s the one moment that seems self-indulgent and testing our patience. It’s also the new song with the very uncomfortable refrain:
I unsubscribe / This ain’t no way of life / I don’t believe the hype.
The night doesn’t end on that note. At the end of “The Suburbs,” the entire crowd joins the band singing a cappella: “Sometimes I can’t believe it / I’m moving past the feeling.” As recently as this week I thought I was moving past my feelings for Arcade Fire’s music. Obviously I’m not. These people aren’t either.
Hearing “Wake Up” tonight doesn’t feel the same way it did at Osheaga, where it also closed the night. There, it erupted as a glorious release. Here, it arrives as a relief, that we’ve somehow navigated this together. For now.
We're just a million little gods causin' rain storms
Turnin' every good thing to rust
I guess we'll just have to adjust
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The last thing Win Butler said in Thursday’s (pre-encore) set was wishing the crowd “peace, love and forgiveness.”
Before any redemption must come reckoning. Before any forgiveness must come accountability. Has that happened here?
In the same article the news broke, Win denied any non-consensual behaviour—offline, anyway. There was also an apology. The apology was crafted with the help of a PR firm—the same one employed by Anthony Weiner. (This fall, I surrendered to a strange urge to read Huma Abedin’s memoir. No reason.)
I don’t begrudge any public figure in trouble for seeking PR help, the same way anyone accused of a crime needs a lawyer regardless of innocence or guilt.
But: really?! Someone got paid to write that? Parts of the apology were terrible, starting with revelations of childhood abuse and a miscarriage. A) I’m really sorry to hear that, and I’m sorry to find out about it this way. B) It doesn’t matter if that news is followed by the phrase “none of this is intended to excuse my behaviour.” Oh, really? Then why bring it up now?
In fact-checking exchanges with Pitchfork, Win offered sexual character references not named Régine. I’m not prudish about open relationships or even age gaps (among adults), but the combination is icky—and throwing unsolicited dick pics in the mix is next-level gross. Win also used the unforgettable post-Ryan-Adams phrase “I googled her and knew she was 18”—which is not the pass he thinks it is. But hey, I guess, some credit is due for not crossing a line that Adams did? (Adams played his first headlining show in Toronto a few days after Arcade Fire were in town, by the way. I haven’t heard any reports.)
The apology did, however, express deep contrition. And it sounded like Win himself knew he bottomed out by 2020—or did only Covid put a stop to this? He said he is now in AA and trying to straighten up and fly right. Let’s hope. Yet that was small solace at a time when all this news hit us like a brick.
“Honey, that’s just men.”
I’d gone through irrational cycles of rationalizations that any fan, friend or family member might go through if they genuinely loved something or someone who acts inexcusably. Well, it’s douchey, but it’s not criminal. On a scale of evil, if R. Kelly is a 10 and Weinstein/Cosby/Hoggard are a 9 and Ghomeshi is a 7 and Def Leppard is a 3 and Bowie is maybe a 1 because that former 15-year-old still says it was consensual and hey it was the ’70s and hey speaking of the ’70s and whataboutwhataboutwhataboutwhatabout…
Wait, what the fuck am I even thinking? Is there a scale and is this even on that scale? Or is this akin to the Aziz Ansari situation, an example that terrified most men—and some women—I knew? Aziz had the decency to crawl away for a while and re-engage carefully; should Win not at least have done the same?
“Fuck that guy,” I was told by a male friend on the periphery of Arcade Fire’s social circle. “He should dip into his millions and pay his band and crew and go home.” That was not going to be an option for a man whom I recently—and regrettably—described in a book as “one of the most tenacious people I’ve ever met.” Win Butler thinks he’ll survive this. That’s what the decision to continue the tour was about.
Fans ultimately have the power. They can take it away.
Am I mired in myopia because I love Arcade Fire? Because I have entirely selfish motives? If I felt I couldn’t live without the music of Hedley (believe me, I can), would I now be rationalizing Jacob Hoggard’s criminal behaviour? I’m a massive Prince fan but that Sinead O’Connor story sure rattled me, as did the memoir by Mayte, who loved him nonetheless. I still listen to Prince.
A rock star I know described the allegations to an NHL player he knows. “That’s it?” responded the jock. “I see way worse than that on a regular basis.” I’m sure Hockey Canada would (now finally) agree.
Meanwhile, the rampant misogyny in pop songs—by Canadians, even!—has been getting worse since at least the ’90s. Oh, look, there was Eminem this month, getting inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame by fellow arch-misogynist Dr. Dre. I know they’re immensely talented, but fuck those guys, now and forever. Oh, and look, The Weeknd—who had a catchy hit single this year about a woman asking him to choke her, whose “sexy” new HBO series boasts about his “sick and twisted mind”—topped the CBC’s year-end list of 2022 albums. (I do like The Weeknd album a lot—musically.)
Meanwhile the CBC has banned Arcade Fire music for the time being, as have other stations. There is zero misogyny in Arcade Fire songs.
whataboutwhataboutwhataboutwhatabout
Did Win Butler act any differently than, say, the narrator of Drake’s “Marvin’s Room”? You know, the hit in which a dude drunk-dials an ex begging her to break up with her boyfriend, to come over for a booty call because he’s not hearing back from any of the other bitches he has on some kind of payroll? That song was a defining moment in Drake’s career, critically and commercially. I’ve had more than a few people—all women!—try and convince me this is a romantic song. Some of them were in a Polaris Prize jury room. There’s now a CBC Music program named after that song.
Popular culture has long been misogynist, but the same is true of “cool” culture, endorsing creepy, stalker behaviour. Bill Murray built a career on those characters. The kid in Rushmore is supposed to be adorable. Almost Famous, that charming rock’n’roll movie about child sex trafficking, was recently adapted into a Broadway musical. The same month the Arcade Fire news broke, by chance I noticed two very smart young(er) media people— not men—raving eloquently about Warren Zevon. Warren fucking Zevon! Who would’ve been cancelled 100x over in today’s climate, for behaviour way worse than Win Butler’s— you should read the book by Zevon’s wife. I still listen to Warren Zevon.
The same weekend the Arcade Fire news broke, Gordon Lightfoot played the CNE: now there’s a venerated legend with an unpretty past of drunken abuse, and some songs in a Canadian continuum with Drake and The Weeknd: Sundown, you better Take Care; that’s what we get for lovin’ him.
whataboutwhataboutwhataboutwhatabout
When did things go wrong? Was Win always like this? (No.) Was it when the band first got famous? (No.) He admits to drinking heavily beginning in his 30s—which would be after 2010. Was it after the Grammy? The new levels of fame? When he decided to become a DJ? After becoming a father? The allegations in question span 2015-20. Which means it was definitely after writing this godawful song, which remains a career low point:
There is a lot of schadenfreude for Arcade Fire in general—there has been for years. Some, of course, is from people who just don’t like the band and/or pop music in general. Fair. There’s also inevitable jealousy from peers who felt the band leapfrogged over everyone else on a wave of unprecedented hype. Also fair.
But for years, Win Butler personally ruffled feathers in Montreal and beyond for the Canadian crime of being ambitious. That dates back to signing a record deal with a small Montreal label one day in 2004 and then balking literally the very next day when a cool American indie came calling. (Which was the inevitable and historically correct choice, BTW.)
The fact that all of Arcade Fire didn’t want to play traditional industry games pissed off large segments of the industry—especially the media, which is used to having its ring kissed. And for much of the band’s career, they had an international manager who never hesitated to throw his un-Canadian weight around: before Arcade Fire, he managed Bjork; after he signed Arcade Fire, he was hired by Paul McCartney. (He parted ways with Arcade Fire in 2017. I don’t know why.)
At the time, I saw a lot of that backlash as either jealousy, bruised ego, or the fact that Win Butler is an American with American-level ambition, living in a provincial town in a colonial country. Before the current allegations, the worst rumour I’d ever heard about him was that he was rude, a social climber, and on (at least) one occasion got dangerously drunk. None of that struck me as unusual, if not entirely forgivable.
“I just assume that all lead singers are sociopaths,” I was told by one female former indie label owner recently.
whataboutwhataboutwhataboutwhatabout
Win Butler co-wrote the songs played by a band I love for all its component parts. I don’t want to see him play with a bunch of ringers—which, it has been argued by some who haunted Montreal barstools 20 years ago, is what the band became after 2004. But that’s the band the world fell in love with. I’m not convinced that would have happened for Win Butler the solo artist; it most definitely would not have happened without Régine, who doesn’t get near enough credit for everything she does in Arcade Fire: songwriting, arranging, instrumentally.
For many fans, of course, whether it’s U2 or Queen or Maroon 5 or whoever: the singer is the band. Which is part of why we’re in the pickle we’re in now. Why even some of the band’s biggest fans have decided they’re through.
Hey, you know who has a smart ditty called “A Man Is Not His Song”? Leslie fucking Feist.
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Friday, December 2. I had no intention or expectation to attend both Toronto shows, but, long story short: I did. (Full disclosure: I was a guest.)
The first night was, by my estimation, about 90% full in all the stands and 75% full on the floor. I’m guessing many people who tried to sell their tickets actually went. The second night: very few people in the upper bowl, and again maybe 75% on the floor. Normal concert capacity at Scotiabank Arena is 19,800. I’d say—unscientifically—that each night had somewhere on either side of 15,000 people: let’s say 30,000 people total over both nights. That’s not half-empty halls. That’s not a failure. This is not a band that has been cancelled.
The second night was also very good, for different reasons. After the interprovincial transit snafu the night before, they now had full production back, which meant a lot of gorgeous projections on the arch backdrop. There was a secondary stage in the middle of the floor, where both Win and Régine would occasionally go to sing, and where the entire band played the encore.
The sets were slightly different. Thank God they didn’t play “Creature Comfort” again. They did not play “No Cars Go” or “Keep the Car Running” or “Power Out”—I didn’t miss them, but I’m sure some fans did. (No “Tunnels,” either.) The second night definitely had more wild cards, only one of which, “Black Mirror,” fell flat. Nice to hear “Intervention.” Very curious to hear “My Body is a Cage,” which sounded better than ever, musically—again, no one in the band is phoning this in, and the backing vocals were gorgeous. I was trying not to watch Win all night, never mind the video-screen close-ups, but one friend later told me she cringed as Win sang this song to Régine, seated at the piano. That song also has the lyrics:
I’m standing on a stage / of fear and self-doubt / it’s a hollow play / but they’ll clap anyway.
I don’t know how many people were jazzed about “Electric Blue,” but I actually like Everything Now’s deep cuts, and it was another chance for Régine to shine, as a dancer and a singer—I’d forgotten how high that song stretches her range.
I definitely did not expect to hear “Crown of Love,” a song that had been on my mind a lot lately:
If you still want me, please forgive me
The crown of love has fallen from me
If you still want me, please forgive me
Because the spark is not within me
Look, I love that song. I’ve loved it since the first time I heard it—which I’m pretty sure is the first time it was ever played, at La Sala Rossa in 2003. Sure was an interesting choice tonight.
Hands down the most pleasantly shocking moment of Friday was the cover choice. The band had been resurrecting their Reflektor-era habit of coving local songs in each city (the Cranberries’ “Dreams” in Dublin, for example), but skipped this on Thursday. At the Friday show, they covered Owen Pallett, their friend and collaborator of 20 years. It wasn’t just any Pallett song—it was the one literally about them, written just after he worked on Funeral: “This is the Dream of Win and Regine.” It’s not a rock song, but they did a rock version, and it was incredibly good. It wasn’t a popular choice, per se—most of the crowd I’m sure was mystified—but it sent thrills through my row, and another writer texted me immediately: “Oh my god.” It’s a choice that fascinates for so many reasons: not just the obvious social and historical ones, and a few Pitchforkian ones, but because of the chorus:
“We can get along! We can get along!
Montreal might eat its young
But Montreal won’t break us down”
The second-last song of Friday’s encore was “We Used to Wait,” my favourite song from The Suburbs. It’s about life before the Internet. Innocent times—for better or worse. Before we knew too much about the people who make the culture we love. Before we might get sent a dick pic from those same people.
“Now our lives are changing fast / hope that something pure can last”
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I’d spent the last two nights—the last three months—wondering about the toxicity of both fame and fandom (including my own). About what the flip side of music’s healing powers can be. About whether this music I’ve loved for years can exist beyond the current news cycle. About the people in this band not named Win Butler—very good people! insanely talented people!—and how they live in the shadows of these songs, songs they should be proud of, songs that touched people’s lives in positive ways. Songs that still mean a lot to me. Songs I will not be throwing away.
I thought of the moral compromises we all make in our lives, every single day: in the country we live in, in the physical and cultural products we purchase, in the clothes we wear, in the food we eat, in the masks we do or do not wear. Complicities and complexities at every turn, in every decision. I thought of what we choose to let slide—and when, and how, and whom. How we long for everything to be “fine,” “normal” — and what that costs.
Just make it painless.
I thought of what we’re afraid to say out loud, in public, about the ways in which we navigate all of this.
The Christian in me thought about reckoning and redemption.
Just because you’ve forgotten / that doesn’t mean you’ve been forgiven
The Feist fan in me thought about being imperfect, about navigating my place here, about documenting this—again, imperfectly.
A man is not his song / Though we all wanna sing along / We all heard those old melodies / Like they're singing right to me … More than a melody is needed
Was I thinking too much? (4,500w later, yes.) More than some people in an arena crowd of 15,000 unmasked people, sure. I could instead be talking about the state of Ontario’s pediatric ICUs right now—that would make me an even bigger societal killjoy. Talk about compromises! I went to an Arcade Fire show and I wore an N95 mask while doing so. I took off the mask at a gathering afterwards. I’m a hypocrite. FWIW, I’m vaxxed to the max and didn’t get sick. Make of all that what you will, metaphorically or otherwise.
whataboutwhataboutwhataboutwhatabout
On the final night of the tour, in Arcade Fire’s hometown of Montreal, for their second-last song, I was told the band covered Leonard Cohen. On the one hand, an obvious choice: a hometown hero. On the other: interesting, considering that Cohen comes from a generation when being a “ladies’ man” was venerated by men and women alike, when brushing a thigh was considered flirtation, when careers could be built on lecherous literature, like Cohen’s idol and friend Irving Layton, like Cohen’s own Beautiful Losers. Cohen was complicated in ways that his venerators often forget. Leonard Cohen was sage, but he wasn’t a saint. (Thankfully, he was no Zevon, either.) Leonard Cohen was human, he was fallible, and—like many of his peers and artistic progeny—probably wouldn’t pass many modern tests. Death of a Ladies Man, indeed.
In the centre of a hockey arena in Montreal, Win Butler stood, surrounded by his wife and the people who’ve been with him through thick and thin for the last 20 years, and sang a song by Leonard Cohen that went like this:
Oh, like a baby, stillborn
Like a beast with his horn
I have torn everyone who reached out for me
But I swear by this song
And by all that I have done wrong
I will make it all up to thee