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“Bad Liar” I wrote with my wife right before we separated, and it’s all about a dying relationship.
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I just had this gaping hole that felt so desolate and scary, and music at least took me away from that. I had to be either listening to or creating music at all times, because I was so afraid of facing a quiet room. It sounds like such a clichéd thing to say, but going through heartbreak is devastating. We have a chaotic relationship, but a stale one seems worse to me. I went through a hard divorce this year and we announced it to the world-then we never wound up signing the papers. Imagine Dragons has never been a love song kind of band, but this record is, like, 90% about love and relationships. The last track, “Real Life,” really solidified things for me. Is there one particular song that made you realize this was going to be a proper album sooner than later? We kind of just get put there because we have a guitarist and because sometimes I sing a little screamy, but I really am more influenced by the culture of hip-hop, and of R&B music. I know there’s some bands that say, “Every three years we’ll put out a record and feed the fans, do a big tour, and then go away,” but we have the ability to continually feed the culture and fan base of Imagine Dragons, so why not do that? I grew up mainly listening to hip-hop and I loved the whole aspect of mixtapes-you could consume stuff from your favorite artists continually, and rock doesn’t do that. Some of these songs were written when we had weeks off on tour some were written a month ago. How did this album come together so quickly? But those hard times led to more songs, frontman Dan Reynolds tells Apple Music.
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And if the pressures that come with mounting pop stardom aren’t enough to discourage a prolific streak, there’s always debilitating personal strife. They’re big hits with big beats and big choruses and big production, made for the big venues that the Los Angeles/Las Vegas quartet regularly play. And as with its predecessors, the songs that comprise Origins-coming just over a year after the blockbuster Evolve-aren't tossed-off lo-fi recordings. Four albums in six years is a breakneck pace for any major artist in 2018, to say nothing of a band as ascendant and ambitious as Imagine Dragons.
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