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Sidewalks is the third studio album by American duo Matt & Kim, consisting of keyboardist and vocalist Matt Johnson and drummer Kim Schifino. It follows 2009's Grand, which the usage of its songs in commercials and TV series and the music video for "Lessons Learned" gained the duo popularity. Sidewalks continues Matt & Kim's basic and high-energy dance-punk synthpop style, but with a higher-fidelity sound courtesy of being tracked in professional studios instead of being self-recorded as was the case with their prior albums. The duo produced Sidewalks with Ben H. Allen, who previously worked with the likes of Gnarls Barkley and Animal Collective.

Sidewalks
Studio album by Matt & Kim
Released	November 2, 2010
Genre	Dance punk synthpop
Length	34:56
Label	Fader Label
Producer	Matt & Kim Ben H. Allen
Matt & Kim chronology
Grand (2009) Sidewalks (2010) Lightning (2012)
Singles from Sidewalks
"Cameras" Released: August 30, 2010 "Block After Block" Released: October 28, 2010

Sidewalks was released on November 2, 2010 on Fader Label, and was promoted with single releases and music videos for "Cameras" and "Block After Block". The album garnered a mixed critical reception, a common criticism being the studio-quality production diluting the band's signature harsh punk personality. It reached the top 40 of the Billboard 200 chart and the top ten of Billboard's Independent Albums, Top Rock Albums and Alternative Albums chart.

Background and composition

Matt & Kim, a duo consisting of keyboardist and vocalist Matt Johnson and drummer Kim Schifino, began their discography with the 2005 extended play To/From and released their debut self-titled studio album in 2006. However, the band gained popularity following usage of songs from their second LP Grand (2009) on series such as Community and Entourage and commercials. Further boosting themselves to public exposure was a video for "Lessons Learned". It garnered accolades at the MTV Video Music Awards and mtvU Woodie Awards of 2009, and was the inspiration for Erykah Badu's video for "Window Seat".[1][2] For their next album, Sidewalks, the duo spent 13 hours a day and six days a week recording.[3]

For the next album, Matt & Kim wanted to focus more on the composition and performance than how it was recorded; thus, they tracked in professional studios and hired Gnarls Barkley and Animal Collective collaborator Ben H. Allen, a different method from their past releases where they would self-record at their homes.[1] Additionally, the two wanted more anthemic material instead of typical songs, as well as incorporate more hip hop influences that were only on two Grand songs: "Good Ol' Fashioned Nightmare" and "Daylight".[1][4] "Block After Block" and "Cameras", in particular, employ percussion typical of Southern hip-hop.[5] The only tracks absent of Sidewalks' stylistic expansion and recording finesse is "Wires" and "Silver Tiles".[6]

The duo's emotional maturity in the lyrics is also displayed on Sidewalks.[6] Certain songs, such as "Block After Block" and "Ice Melts", combine the group's animated upbeat aspects with melancholy, resulting in bittersweet tracks.[7] "Northeast" is a somber piano ballad about nostalgia for their child containing lyrical references to their hit "Daylight", while "Where You’re Coming From" depicts the subject on the brink of giving up willing to try again, as Johnson sings, "I'm on my feet today, and I’m walking to the grave. I drew this map by hand to show you how to be a man."[6][8]

Aside from the professional method of recording resulting in a more high-fidelity sound, Sidewalks is consistent with Matt & Kim's prior work; it is a dance-punk synthpop record that is simple, high-energy, jovially sung, filled with bombastic drum beats and repetitive synthesizer lines, and lyrically is optimistic, references being in New York, and blurs the line between being tongue-in-cheek and genuine.[lower-alpha 1]

Release and promotion

Naming the album was a tough part of the process. Matt & Kim's initial plan was Deluxe, but the label found it the "worst possible, most confusing name", reasoning consumers would confuse it as a deluxe edition of their self-titled first LP.[4] It was not until a drive through Brooklyn just after the album's completion that the name Sidewalks was conceived on the spot.[14] From June 17 to November 6, 2010, Matt and Kim went on tour to support their upcoming third album.[15] None on the LP was performed live by the group; it was played on the public address system of the venue before each show began, and the duo's setlist was all of Grand.[1] On August 30, 2010, the name of their next album was announced, and its lead single "Cameras" premiered on 1077theend.com before being released officially the next day.[16] The next single was "Block After Block", released on October 28, 2010.[17] "AM/FM Sound" was available for streaming on Entertainment Weekly's website on November 1, 2010, before the album was issued the next day by Fader Label.[3]

The Sidewalks music videos had been planned since August 2010.[14] The music video for "Cameras" was released on January 20, 2011, and depicts Schifino and Johnson bloodily fighting each other with equipment. The two excessively stunt-trained, and there were many on-set injuries during shooting according to the group's spokesperson.[18] A video for "Block After Block" was released on June 16, 2011, and involve the duo flash performing in various parts of New York City, such as Rockefeller Plaza, a Home Depot, the subway, and Chinatown.[19] Both videos were directed by Jonathan Del Gatto.[19] Promotion of Sidewalks was supposed to finish with a video for "Good For Great"; however, it was only announced by Johnson at a press conference and was never released.[20]

Reception

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	62/100[21]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[9]
The A.V. Club	C+[10]
Consequence of Sound	[22]
Entertainment Weekly	B[2]
NME	[23]
Pitchfork	6.3/10[8]
PopMatters	[24]
Rolling Stone	[12]
Slant Magazine	[7]
Spin	8/10[13]

Sidewalks holds an aggregate score of 62/100 on Metacritic based on 19 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[21] As with previous releases, the center of debate was on Matt & Kim's upbeat tone, which critics analogized as being extremely sugary.[10][23][8] Luke O'Neil of The Boston Globe and Chris Coplan of No Ripcord praised Sidewalks as a "street-savvy" and "likable" presentation of the confusion of youth.[6][11] The album was also called "therapy you can spaz out to" by J. Edward Keyes of Rolling Stone, who considered its "pervasive optimism" its greatest feature.[12] On the other hand, NME's Ben Hewitt was turned off by its "vomit-inducing" and "sickly" sound, "chart-pap melodies", and "sodden clichés", and joked Johnson's vocals "wavers unconvincingly like an exasperated Dad failing to assert their authority".[23]

The professional production was generally criticized for watering down the duo's characteristic amateur punk hardiness and rebellion, most displayed in their live performances, in favor of a pop sound.[lower-alpha 2] To reviewers, the synthesizers were more in the foreground, Johnson's vocals less raw, and Schifion's drums more "muted"-sounding and sidetracked by an increased presence of electronic percussion.[25][26] As Christian Williams of The A.V. Club argued, "the album pinballs off the spiffy new production elements without ever racking up high scores, as track after track ends on feel-good shout-alongs that never really inspire shouting along."[10] Pitchfork's Rebecca Raber concluded it made way for "repetitive, rhythmic chords that almost sound like samples and drums that sound mechanical (instead of manic)" and magnified the group's worst aspects, such as its monotonous lyrics, vocal performance and "crude" synthesizer lines.[8] One critic who thought the hi-fi production improved the duo's sound was Chris Martins of Spin. He felt its larger sound and increased emphasis on chorus better reflected the "in-person oomph" of their live performances, and that its "best tracks trade Kim's punk drumming for handclaps, sleigh bells, and bassy kicks".[13]

Track listing

Sidewalks[27]

No.	Title	Length
1.	"Block After Block"	2:56
2.	"AM/FM Sound"	3:15
3.	"Cameras"	3:33
4.	"Red Paint"	3:07
5.	"Where You're Coming From"	4:09
6.	"Good for Great"	3:50
7.	"Northeast"	2:53
8.	"Wires"	3:59
9.	"Silver Tiles"	3:38
10.	"Ice Melts"	3:46
Total length:		34:56

Personnel

Credits from the liner notes.[27]

• Matt & Kim – artwork, songwriter
• Matt Johnson – mixing, producer
• Ben H. Allen – mixing, producer
• Rob Gardner – engineer
• Oliver Straus – engineer, mixing, producer
• Andy Marcinkowski – editing
• Joe LaPorta – mastering
• Sam Friedman – logo
• Kalani Fujimori – design
• Dave McNair – mastering

Charts

Weekly chart performance for Sidewalks

Chart (2010)	Peak position
US Billboard 200[28]	30
US Independent Albums (Billboard)[29]	5
US Top Alternative Albums (Billboard)[30]	5
US Top Rock Albums (Billboard)[31]	6

Notes

References

На других языках

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- [en] Sidewalks (album)

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[ru] Sidewalks

Sidewalks (рус. Тротуары) — второй студийный альбом американской дэнс-панк группы Matt & Kim, вышедший 2 ноября 2010 года на лейбле Fader Label.

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