Phantoms

Phantoms

Marianas Trench love a good concept album. The Vancouver pop-rockers’ last full-length, Astoria, was a spirited tribute to the 1980s complete with xylophones, funky guitar riffs, and Eurythmics-esque synths (mostly recorded with gear specific to that decade). Here, on album five, they riff on the idea of a haunted house. Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s ghost stories and his infatuation with madness, the songs often start subdued before descending into delirium. Death and dying are lyrical themes (“The Death of Me,” “The Killing Kind”), and spooky sounds are brought in with harpsichords and theremins, but it’s all executed with a pretty light touch. Even “Your Ghost” sounds driving and exuberant.

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