When you put on Foster the People's new album and you're happily bopping along to the infectious funk-disco beat of the first track, you might hardly notice the growing sense of dread in the lyrics, as dark as the music is silly-light. Welcome back, Mark Foster.
“My friends were going out last night and I still haven't heard from them,” he sings in “See You in the Afterlife,” a tune that has scary newspaper headlines, an empty Colosseum and even a reference to the war in Ukraine. “It's like we've all been hypnotized.”
It's been seven years since 2017’s album “Sacred Hearts Club" and Foster and his bandmates haven't lost a step, making thoughtful, first-rate pop for a jangled, insecure era with the 11-track “Paradise State of Mind,” the majority written with Isom Innis and with Foster producing the lion's share for the first time.
Like the last collection, Foster the People has glistening pop beside complex tuners, with many of the songs eventually dipping into experimental territory or heavy distortion, like the unconventional flute solo on “Sometimes I Wanna Be Bad” and the hard-to-love “Glitchzig,” which goes through a half-dozen time signatures, shrieking trumpet and elements of antiseptic Kraftwerk.
Highlights include “Lost in Space,” filled with a falsetto chorus and hand-claps, which sounds like it was designed for a roller rink in the ’70s — with unsteady lyrics like “I let the darkness in to teach me” — and “Let Go,” which starts out like a dreamy blast of positive vibes until the last third, when what can only be described as heavenly robots hijack the song, singing, “To be broken is to be set free.”
The heavily distorted, synthetic-sounding “Feed Me” is like a sexy come-on in the digital era — “I want to hack your code and be your anti-hero/Turn you on and let my one activate your zero” — while Foster reveals perhaps his motivation for all this wonderful, creepy weirdness on the last song, “A Diamond to be Born.”
“I look at myself through a broken lens,” he sings in the song, so spacey that it's almost a prayer. “Try my best to keep from unravelling.” You and us both, brother. Along the way, he's given us another diamond.
Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits
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This cover image released by Atlantic Records shows "Paradise State of Mind" by Foster the People. (Atlantic Records via AP)
BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) — Charles Leclerc qualified on pole position for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix as Max Verstappen was sixth and Lando Norris only 17th on Saturday in a session that could have a big impact on the Formula 1 title race.
Ferrari's Leclerc, who won the last race in Italy, was fastest by .321 seconds from McLaren's Oscar Piastri, and the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz Jr. was third. Pole marked a dramatic turnaround for Leclerc, who crashed in the first practice session Friday.
“It hasn’t been an easy weekend because (of) the crash in FP1, which didn’t make me lose confidence. I knew that the pace was there," Leclerc said. "But you’ve got to build back up to speed.”
Leclerc is on pole in Baku for the fourth year running, but he has yet to win the race.
Norris was on what seemed to be a lap fast enough to progress from the first part of qualifying as one of the top 15. But he had to slow for a yellow flag that was apparently for Esteban Ocon's slow-moving Alpine. Norris' time from his first lap missed the 15th-place cutoff by .137 of a second.
“There was nothing I could do” about the yellow flag, Norris said. “Frustrating, but now we look ahead to tomorrow and see where we can maximize the result.”
Norris moved up a place on the grid hours later when Pierre Gasly, who had been 13th, was disqualified for breaking rules on fuel flow rates.
Norris is second in the standings, 62 points behind Verstappen with eight races remaining.
McLaren confirmed before the race weekend that it would favor Norris over Piastri to help his title challenge, with Norris suggesting the Australian would be asked to make way for him on track in some situations.
That almost certainly won't happen Sunday with 15 places separating the teammates in qualifying. Piastri is aiming to fight for a second career win.
“Our race pace is good, but the Ferrari is certainly not slow,” he said.
Defending champion Verstappen, who hasn't won any of the last six races, seemed better in Baku but was sixth and said he'd clipped a curb at “the worst time it could have happened.” Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez was fourth, beating Verstappen in qualifying for the first time all year.
Verstappen said the Red Bull was improved from the Italian Grand Prix, where he finished sixth, but questioned whether the team's attempts to refine the setup ahead of qualifying made things worse.
"On a street circuit you need to be comfortable and confident to be able to attack corners and it is harder to do this when the car is a bit more unpredictable," he said.
George Russell was fifth for Mercedes, ahead of Verstappen, with Lewis Hamilton seventh and Fernando Alonso eighth for Aston Martin.
There was a bizarre incident in the final part of qualifying when Williams' Alex Albon stopped on his way out of the pits to remove a large cooling fan that the team left in his air intake. Albon qualified 10th and the team was fined 5,000 euros ($5,500). Throwing the cooling fan out of the car as Albon did was the “least worst option” because it avoided further disrupting the session, the stewards' ruling said.
Albon's teammate Franco Colapinto, in only his second F1 race weekend, was ninth in the best qualifying result for an Argentine driver in 42 years.
British teen Oliver Bearman, standing in at Haas for the suspended Kevin Magnussen, was 11th after recovering from a crash in the third practice Saturday morning.
AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc of Monaco in action during a Formula One Grand Prix practice in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits)
Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc of Monaco in action during a Formula One Grand Prix qualifying in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits)
Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc of Monaco in action during a Formula One Grand Prix qualifying in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits)
Haas driver Oliver Bearman of the United Kingdom walks through the pit lane during the Formula One Grand Prix qualifying in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (Ali Haideric/Pool via AP)
Red Bull driver Max Verstappen of the Netherlands enters the pit lane during the Formula One Grand Prix qualifying in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (Ali Haideric/Pool via AP)
McLaren driver Lando Norris of Britain in action during a Formula One Grand Prix practice in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits)
Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc of Monaco in action during a Formula One Grand Prix qualifying in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits)
