Steve Aoki - Neon Future III

Steve Aoki
Neon Future III
2018
Spotify

Aoki's Neon Future series has always been about blending genres and experimentation. Steve tries to find the most marketable collaborations He can, while still including just enough science to make his vision seem legit. On the first Neon Future it was a feature by futurist Ray Kurzweil, on part II it was JJ Abram and now We have a spoken word description of the noble gasses by everyone's favorite TV scientists Bill Nye. This approach seemed like a novel idea at first, especially from someone who seemed to be making music for the future. but now it seems like a thinly veiled gimmick to sell pop records. Aoki is exactly who He has always been, a dub-step producers who now makes pop, but as the world is moving beyond his sound You would think He would change with it, but you would be wrong. These songs, besides the names of the feature list, could be off of any and every Steve Aoki record. Big booming EDM songs made for festival stages and clubs, the man knows how to get an audience moving, but more and more it's all starting to seem a bit silly. The cake throwing that is ever present at his live shows has become more of a chore than some kind of wild release of expression. He has just done it all at this point, and doing it again just feels like work. There are moments that sound fun and hell if you were blasted I'm sure you could dance around and enjoy the colors of his live show, but is anyone still listening to this stuff on the daily? I don't think so.

The idea makes some sense, taking artists who typically aren't invovled in EDM like Blink-182 or Jim Adkins of Jimmy Eat World, and see how they sound singing over Aoki's productions. The problem is the stars don't really shine, nor doe Steve Aoki build them up, His music just takes over everything because it is so fucking distinct. The word that keeps coming to mind over and over is gimmick, this record feels like a massive gimmick. The Blink-182 track for example "Why Are We So Broken" is about just what you think it is, but it sounds exactly like what a Steve Aoki Blink collaboration would sound like, there is no surprise at all. Either one of them cold have released this song without the other and no one would have noticed. "Bella Thorne" delivers an abysmal performance on "Do Not Disturb" a song with a message that has been done and done to death. Era Istrefi also sounds exactly like Tove Syryke It would be nice is Steve had one new idea on this entire record, but He just doesn't. Instead what we are left with is an album about the future that is firmly stuck in the past. Not ideal.

3.6 out of 10