“God Save the Animals”: An experimental take on human growth

Alex G has always been experimental in his music in some way or another. His new album “God Save the Animals” takes it to a new level.

I have been an Alex G fan for a few years now. Like most fans, I started out by listening to the album “Trick” and then slowly fell down the rabbit hole. Alex G is a very distinctive and unique artist; he’s very refreshing. Part of the reason he’s so unique is that he’s always experimented with his sound and taken risks. “God Save the Animals” is by far his most experimental and artistic album yet.

Alex G’s lyrics have always been raw and vulnerable, a reflection of his insecurities and troubles he’s faced.  Even if the lyrics can sometimes seem more random, fans find themselves relating to the songs more and more each listen. In this album, Alex G dives deeper into these raw emotions by using  the motif of religion to explore a new view on these emotions, even though he doesn’t claim to be religious himself.

The album starts off strong with “After All”, “Runner”, “Mission”, and “S.D.O.S” being some of my favorites of the album. While the sounds of “God Save the Animals” mostly seem different from his earlier work, a lot of these songs carry similar traits. This includes some distorted noises and chords as well as some more sinister undertones. There are darker lyrics coupled with a bubbly tune, which can be expected from Alex G.

To be completely honest, I appreciate the direction Alex G was taking in some of the songs, but they just did not do it for me.“No Bitterness”,  “Cross the Sea”, “Immunity,”  were some of those. The production just sounded cheesy to me and the weird autotune didn’t work. Some of the sound production sounded like nine year old me playing around with the sound effects on a keyboard for the first time.  Maybe I’m just too shallow to understand it. Maybe it was just bad.

“Ain’t it Easy,” was by far my favorite on the album. The lyrics seem simplistic enough at first but they are just so sweet, and  the melancholy strumming  and chord progression was just so good. This is definitely a song that makes me want to have a major heartbreak just so I can sit in my car and cry to it.

Throughout the album, the reason for the title becomes clear. Alex G uses different lyrics and sounds to almost blur the basic emotion to those of pets or animals to that of humans: raw and pure. The album is far more uplifting and hopeful then other, probably hence the religious part of it. The songs of growth and forgiveness are a wide contrast to the despair and regret of earlier albums. It’s very skillfully done. 

I do consider “God Save the Animals” to be Alex G’s most intense album, it certainly takes the listener along for a ride. I’ve seen it hated on by way too many people. Alex G’s sound has never been uniform, if you’re expecting him to create the same three songs in different fonts, he’s not the artist for you. By being so artistically talented, Alex G is going to explore new genres and new sounds. Even if I disliked some of those sounds, I find it a ton more interesting than the alternative.