You! Me! Dancing!

Few songs have captured the specific euphoria of collective youth experience with such uncomplicated generosity. Los Campesinos! arrive at this track with every instrument they own and a philosophy that more is always more — violin and glockenspiel jostle for space alongside guitars and a rhythm section that plays with gleeful aggression, the whole arrangement approaching chaos but never quite crossing into it. The male and female vocals trade lines and occasionally stack together, giving the song a communal quality, as though it is being sung by a group of friends rather than performed by a band, the distinction mattering enormously to the emotional effect. There is a particular strain of British indie pop that mistakes volume for feeling, but this song earns its exuberance through sincerity — the joy it expresses is not ironic, not qualified, not aware of how uncool unambiguous happiness is supposed to be. The lyrics concern themselves with dancing as a form of survival and connection, with the specific relief that comes from surrendering self-consciousness to music. It belongs to the late 2000s scene of bands who wore their literary influences openly and their hearts more openly still. You reach for this at the beginning of a night out when the anticipation is better than any actual event could be, or at the precise moment on a dancefloor when a song you love comes on and everything else temporarily stops mattering.