Imagine Dragons – Evolve album review: Worthy of the hipster kudos it seeks

Evolve
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Artist: Imagine Dragons
Genre: Rock
Label: KIDinaKORNER/Polydor Records

You get the impression from their third album that Imagine Dragons are striving desperately for the kind of hipster kudos that would see them viewed as the heirs to a stadium rock band like U2’s throne.

Instead, the Grammy-winning Las Vegas quartet come off as Coldplay’s dorky little brothers; purveyors of earnest, bombastic pop-rock with a synthesised bent.

Not that there's anything wrong with that; Walking the Wire and Whatever It Takes are both arms-aloft anthems, but the more enjoyable tracks follow an 1980s pop template, like the Hall & Oates-style Make It Up to You and Start Over.

The hip-hop stylings of Thunder are ill-advised, but it's easy to see why Imagine Dragons have been so successful to date.

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Whether this kind of glossy grandiosity has longevity is an entirely different matter. Imaginedragonsmusic.com

Download: Start Over, Make It Up To You

Lauren Murphy

Lauren Murphy

Lauren Murphy is a freelance journalist and broadcaster. She writes about music and the arts for The Irish Times