"You Don't Get Me High Anymore" is the lead single from New York trip-pop/synthpop duo Phantogram's (Josh Carter and Sarah Barthel) upcoming third album Three (2016, forthcoming). This new track showcases some of the duo's best strengths: atmospheric synths and drums, a club-ready beat, Barthel's powerful vocal chops and emotionally intelligent lyrics. As AllMusic's Tim Sendra has noted, the indie duo are capable of provocative and catchy tracks that serve a wide range of moods: "[Voices is] filled with catchy, emotion-packed songs that will sound great booming out of radio speakers, soundtracking late nights spent alone and wondering, and anytime some really powerful modern pop is needed".
The track nevertheless hints that Phantogram's new material is going to be darker, more bombastic and plumb greater emotional depths (Barthel and Carter revealed that heartbreak is a key inspiration, as is Barthel's loss of her sister to suicide). The chorus is straighforward enough, expressing a deep sense of dissatisfaction and unease, while comparing love to addiction: 'Nothing is fun/ Not like before/ You don't get me high anymore/ Used to take one/ Now it's takes four/ You don't get me high anymore':
“Josh Carter: "You Don’t Get Me High Anymore” is kind of about this feeling of everything being redundant and nothing being good enough. Metaphorically, it’s about addiction. It’s also about certain things that we see in culture, pop culture, and even music that we find redundant, that we’ve always kind of strayed away from as a group.
Sarah Barthel: Yeah, it also taps into this idea of wanting to feel something. Basically, wanting to feel something strong and doing whatever it takes to feel it again, because you know it feels good and you miss it".
Sarah Barthel, Pitchfork
The verses rely on some unconventional lyricism, however: 'Woke up stoned in the backseat from a dream where my teeth/ Fell out of my head'; 'My handshake, cellophane, landscape, mannequin faking it/ The best that I can'. On Genius, Barthel revealed that "the inspiration behind most of the song is inspired by cut up words, William S Burroughs or David Bowie style of freeform writing". It's often difficult to keep track of what Barthel is singing during the verses, but the effect is an edgy, jarring and kinetic sense of unease and disgruntlement. It's only fitting that the Grant Singer-directed video relies on several melodramatic action-packed sequences that scream beauty and danger.
