LCD began as a mostly live performance band in fronted by James Murphy — a year-old music fan who was looking to finally cash in on all the years spent participating in the scene from the shadows. Having been the co-founder of Brooklyn record label Death From Above, and after DJing his fair share of parties throughout New York, he decided that there was nothing stopping him from throwing his hat into the ring and cranking out his own tunes.
Songs like Daft Punk is Playing At My House, and Losing My Edge are these sardonic and curmudgeonly tongue-in-cheek bops, which serve a dual purpose of critiquing the drunk scenester kids who were likely dancing along at their shows. Murphy weaves incredibly infectious electronic-infused drum grooves with drawn-out, euphorically crescendoing cadences to make some of the most easily danceable songs of the time — but not without a strong self-aware sense of irony.
After no more than nine years of performing, with three studio albums, an infamous Nike-commissioned EP, and a handful of singles under their belt, LCD Soundsystem decided to hang up the boots and head into early retirement, much to the dismay of the pantheon of fans they had amassed. Over the near-decade they had been together, their records had charted in the top 10 spots while receiving high critical acclaim, earning them collaborations with filmmakers like Spike Jonze, and even seeing them headline international festivals.
But Murphy had decided that the most interesting thing that the band could do — at the peak of its notoriety — was to stop. This decision confused fans at the time, and still confuses fans to this day, but it is admittedly somewhat understandable. The journey to Madison Square Garden became a musical pilgrimage to some, and so the stakes were impossibly high for Murphy and the crew. This really was an all-in show, and it bloody well popped off.
For nearly a decade, Murphy — at 41, at least a good decade older than the crowd on Saturday night — stood as a self-mocking totem to a certain kind of experience. Losing My Edge was an anthem for the aging music nerd, with lyrics detailing a comically epic list of historical dates, bands and attended gigs: the anti-hipster's defence against "the art-school Brooklynites in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered eighties".
Unlike some of the output of those art-school Brooklynites, which has tended to espouse a tone of context free apathy, Murphy has always been interested in creating a record of the times.
And as if to prove he's still one step ahead, Murphy is now bowing out. The three-and-a-half-hour concert included a guest appearance by Arcade Fire, who sang back-up on North American Scum, prompting chants of 'North American! North American! On Twitter, The Believer contributing editor Brandon Stosuy asked: "How many upcoming something novels can we expect to use LCD Soundsystem's final shows as a metaphor for something?
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