Chemistry

Album: Everything Now (2017)
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Songfacts®:

  • Win Butler has fallen in love on this New Orleans big-band jam. However, the Arcade Fire frontman comes across as a tad creepy as he tries to convince the girl that there is a chemical attraction between them.

    I got the money, and I got the time
    I got a secret, gonna make you mine
    I can feel you making eyes at me
    Baby you can try, but you can't deny


    Everything Now was promoted using a fake corporation, Everything Now corp, and used fake products to represent each song - "Chemistry" was marketed with an energy drink. It may be that Butler's stalker-easque behavior towards the girl is in part a metaphor for the way corporations chase consumers down.
  • The scientific description of a couple in love as a chemical attraction has been utilized by a number of songwriters down the years. Other examples include tracks by Rush, Semisonic and Escape The Fate.
  • Directed by Ray Tintori, and animated by Starburns Industries (Rick & Morty), the song's music video follows a dog and a cat who meet at a wedding reception and fall in love. Tintori has previously worked with the likes of MGMT and Chairlift.

    Win Butler said Arcade Fire had wanted to work with the director since the early 2010s. "There was talk of collaborating during 'The Suburbs' shoot – we were going to film it in New Orleans but then it got moved to Austin at the last minute, and Ray was caught up working on Beasts Of The Southern Wild," he said.

    "So it was very full circle to finally be working with him in New Orleans during Mardi Gras," Butler added. "There is a playful, carnivalesque energy to the song; to capture that by filming literally during carnival felt right."

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