Fucked Up: David Comes To Life

David Comes To Life is Fucked Up’s most musically accessible album wrapped up in its most fearlessly pretentious and flat-out incomprehensible concept. A self-proclaimed rock opera, David Comes To Life concerns a downtrodden factory worker who meets girl, loses girl, gets accused of killing girl, and careens off on an existential journey into self that explores the meaning (and necessity) of loss and the transformative power of love. (Or something like that.)

Much like the “stories” that form the spine of The Who’s Quadrophenia, Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade, and Green Day’s American Idiot—all spiritual godfathers of David Comes To Life—the specifics of the concept matter less than the grandly rendered musical broad strokes and plainly stated big questions about identity and the means to achieve self-empowerment. For Fucked Up, the story of David Comes To Life is merely a meaty hook on which to hang a series of rousing rock songs, like the pile-driving “Remember My Name,” the lovestruck “Queen Of Hearts” (which boasts the most hypnotic psych-rock outro this side of Deerhunter), and “Ship Of Fools,” a spiteful growl that culminates with a guitar solo that can be credibly likened to U2.

It’s true—what was once a punk band has turned into a monster of arena rock. Damian Abraham still howls with the blood-covered intensity of Fucked Up’s basement-show days, hoarsely spitting out doubts about the limits of political activism on “Running On Nothing.” But sonic architect Mike Haliechuk now parcels out the music in compact, melodic, rage-filled sledgehammer bursts that typically last about four minutes—perfect for radio stations that refer to the band as “F-ed Up.” For a highfalutin concept record, the component parts of David Comes To Life are downright catchy. They’re also bracingly potent and screamingly vital; David Comes To Life is the work of a band openly aspiring to be great, and pulling it off.