Arcade Fire’s 2004 debut studio album Funeral features the song “Wake Up.” The Canadian band released Funeral through Merge Records on September 14, 2004, and the album became one of the defining indie-rock records of the decade.
Much of Funeral was recorded at Hotel2Tango in Montreal. Its title reflects the deaths of several relatives of band members during the recording process, giving songs about grief, change, memory, and childhood innocence an unusually personal foundation.
“Wake Up” was the album’s fifth and final single. Its huge group vocals and orchestral rock arrangement helped make it one of Arcade Fire’s signature songs, while the rest of Funeral includes tracks such as “Rebellion (Lies)” and “Neighborhood #3 (Power Out).”
The album’s Canadian identity can sometimes cause confusion because the band’s members had varied backgrounds and the record later became internationally famous. Funeral was also Arcade Fire’s first full-length studio album; the group’s self-titled release from 2003 was an EP, not a debut LP.