4.0 + Part of what I think makes "Funeral" successful is that Arcade Fire somehow manages to harness their emotional and sonic intensity letting it spill over only at climactic moments. I love how that album propels you on a journey, leading with urgency, punctuating the trip with colorful bursts of ecstatic emotion (e.g. "Wake Up"). With Neon Bible, AF are mostly able to dial in all that energy but there are moments where the intensity proves more than they can handle, and they end up sounding overblown. First is "Intervention" where Win Butler lets go on the vocals, belching out sincerity over a massive orchestra and it all sounds like Bruce Springsteen at his sweatiest and most insistent (see "Born to Run"). Not my favorite. Second are the screechy vocals paired with synthesized strings on "Black Wave." Finally, I've always disliked "No Cars Go" - it sounds like a parody of 2007 indie rock. As a side note: why did so many indie songs of that era feature that group-shouted "HEY!" trope? (see also "Little Talks" by Of Monsters and Men) With all this said, I still really like this record, notably the three song stretch of "The Well and the Lighthouse", "(Antichrist Television Blues" and "Windowsill."