Romance by Fontaines D.C. (4/5)

Must Hear Tracks: “Favourite” “Horseness is the Whatness” “Starburster” “Motorcycle Boy”

(Note: I recently had a lively, drunken discussion with an Irishman about this very band and album, and while I was quick to mention Fontaines D.C. is an authentically Irish, blue collar type band, my companion was adamant they they’re actually just a bunch of “posh school boys” cosplaying as everymen. I figured he would have a more sensitive nose for that kind of bullshit, being Irish himself, so you might want to take my claims of Fontaines’ authenticity with a grain of salt. Regardless of our paths of reasoning, though, we both agreed that Romance was a solid album. Him because it felt like Fontaines finally dropped the pretense of blue collar, rough and tumble upbringing and adopted a more honest, “authentic” artistic vision. Myself because I believed (probably falsely), that they wore out their authenticity and chose a more adventurous angle for Romance to keep things fresh. Same conclusion, different starting points. Just goes to show the difference between narrative and personal experience. Stay wary out there, friends. Anyway, the Romance review now appears unedited, warts and all. Enjoy!)

What’s a band to do after they fulfill their own prophecy? After they steadily climb from a small-club post-punk band, to COVID-era critical darlings, to festival mainstays in 5 short years? All without losing their lyrical flair? All without sacrificing an ounce of authenticity? (Irish accents and all). Where do you go after you get big?

If you ask Fontaines D.C. (Dublin City, not District of Columbia), the answer is to strap in “for the long haul.” Maybe don some Y2K neon suits, dye your hair pink, and entertain the question: “maybe romance is a place?” As a band liberated from creative constraints, not only is such a question fair game, it inspired an aesthetic transformation and one of the year’s most replayable albums. With their 2024 offering, Romance, Fontaines D.C. are done cutting their teeth. Now they’re here to get weird with it.

Conceptually, frontman Grian Chatten compared Romance to a series of snow-globes. Little, self-contained worlds. Renderings of romance in all its shades: the frightening electricity of beginning, the dizzy resignation of ending, and everything in between. In this trip through the valley of romance, the highest points come at the beginning and end. Romance is bookended by the bangers.

The near-peak is “Starburster,” which comes in hot after the movie-trailer melodrama of the title track. It begins with buoyant Mellotron strings that give way to thrashing, blown-out drums. Over the band’s stylish take on nu-metal, Chatten spits a tale of manic lust. His protagonist is on the prowl, chasing “momentary blissness” He’s trying to “see you alone,” trying to “bounce the bone,” and trying to “trap all of your charm in a canister.” As a tasteful touch, the chorus features the most musical use of guttural inhalation I’ve ever heard. Suffocation and madness in an unholy union. One of many small details that go a long way.

On the opposite peak, “Favourite” closes the album with all the ecstasy and uncertainty of fresh love. It plays like a reinterpretation of the Cure’s “Just Like Heaven,” complete with a similarly shimmering lead guitar. Lovestruck epiphanies abound:

Ah, it makes sense when you understand, The misery made me another marked man,

And I’m always looking over my shoulder, And each new day I get another year older,

Shoulder bound to the frame of the door, Tuned into shape like a stone on the shore,

But if there was lightning in me, Then you know who it was for . . .

Did you know, I can claim the dreamer from the dream?

Make you feel, everything you’ve never even seen?

Paranoid or ecstatic? Eroded or overjoyed? In this case, the answer is “all of the above.” And despite the gravitational war of emotions going on, the narrator still pledges the very spark within him. Though there are far bleaker moments on the album, Chatten singled this one out as the scariest. It is the dreadful understanding that there’s no way to dam up the feelings, and no way to ensure that it doesn’t crash and burn in the end. The message is clear: take the leap anyway.

Between the euphoria of “Favourite” and the mania of “Starburster” is the valley floor. The dark depths of Romance. Down here, we meet “people sick with feeling” who “never align.” Sometimes “retchin’ with desire,” sometimes feeling utterly numb “In the Modern World,” sometimes avoiding “what the real story is” because it “wouldn’t play that well.” These are bumpy rides, to be sure, but that doesn’t make them any less romantic.

Take “Motorcycle Boy” as a chilling example. The chorus puts you on the bike, careening through town. In a daze after breaking the relationship off. Head spinning. Streetlights sliding past, in sync with each elliptical repetition of the song’s title. Fontaines perform a stunning balancing act of moods here. First and foremost, the shock of the breakup comes across in the dizzying chant of “motorcycle boy.” Expanding the emotional palette are triumphant percussion and piano flourishes that strike a balance between sorrow and hope. It’s the mental state of a post-breakup ride. Truly alone for the first time in a long time. A rush of freedom tempered by a pit in your stomach trying to escape as a sob. Laughing to fend off the tears.

Like “Motorcycle Boy,” most tracks on Romance serve as vignettes of human connection. Amidst these episodes, “Horseness is the Whatness” is the sore thumb that breaks the 4th wall. There’s no tale to be told here. It’s a heart-to-heart with the listener. Chatten starts off tenderly, explaining some of the the “basics” of Romance 101. Fatherly advice: keep your wits about you, “always leave a card out,” things of that nature. When the monologue ends, he slips away into a baroque garden of strings. The tune meanders peacefully for awhile without him. But when he parts the leaves again, the existential crisis cannon is loaded, and he fires:

Will someone find out what the word is, that makes the world go round?

Cause I thought it was love,

But some say, that it has to be choice,

I read it in some book, or an old packet of smokes.

And basics, I guess I get the gist, there’s not that much to miss:

You choose or you exist

With that line hanging in the air, everything snaps together. These independent snow-globes of romance aren’t so independent, after all. They are the sums of our decisions, the ways we build and break our relationships. As helpless as we may feel in the face of love, or lust, or the desire to tear it all down, action is a conscious choice. As that revelation sinks in, the initial question posed in the title track is answered: Romance is a place, but it’s a different place for each of us. We are constantly bombarded with blueprints for romance -rules to follow and fantasies to expect- by the media soup we swim in. Despite all the manufactured romance we consume, no amount of vicarious living can prepare us for the real thing. The way we treat each other remains our own choice. “Horseness is the Whatness” reminds us of that fact.

By virtue of their unwavering creative cohesion, Fontaines D.C. have sidestepped the wave of expectation that can so easily extinguish a young, promising band’s fire. They’ve broken out of the humble scene they came up in, the city they’re named for, and, now, with Romance, they’ve ventured out of their familiar creative harbor. Their usual post punk and dark clothes has taken on some sunshine, some psychedelia, and some cinematic sweep. Out of the bay and into the open ocean. With no set genre or aesthetic to limit them, the only ones who know where Fontaines D.C. will go next are Fontaines D.C.. A band who practices what they preach. You choose or you exist.

Sources: Jools Holland Interview, ‘Sold For Parts’ Documentary, “Just Like Heaven” Live Cover, At home with Fontaines D.C.’s Grian Chatten (NME Interview), Starburster Official Video, Fontaines D.C. Genius lyrics page, “Big” music video, “Starburster” music video, “Favourite” music video,