Cage the Elephant: Neon Pill Vinyl LP

Why you'll love it

This EU-pressed LP comes in a gatefold jacket. The title track earned a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Performance, and "Neon Pill," "Rainbow" and "Metaverse" all went to No. 1 on Billboard's Alternative Songs chart.

This edition

Gatefold jacket
Pressed in the EU

About the album

Five years is the longest Cage the Elephant had ever gone between albums, and Neon Pill tells you why without ever turning maudlin. Singer Matt Shultz came through a serious health crisis and back out the other side, and he wrote much of the record along the way, then sat down afterwards to work out what the songs really meant.

"Rainbow" was the first song finished, a love song for his wife, Eva, while "Out Loud" and "Over Your Shoulder" remember the Shultz brothers' father. "Float Into the Sky" and "Metaverse" dig into isolation, "Ball and Chain" brings back the glam swagger, and piano ballads sit next to the guitar songs. Matt Shultz said the band reached for nothing outside themselves this time, and Brad says that once they got going they finished in about a month.

Those chart toppers took the band to 13 No. 1s on the Alternative Songs chart, level with Green Day and Linkin Park. Five years is a long wait, though we've stood at Toronto streetcar stops that felt longer.

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