I spent an hour researching Japanese birdlife and didn’t get a single joke out of it, so here’s some reviews.

[Video][Website]
[4.36]

Edward Okulicz: Birds of Tokyo are a group who’ve never quite worked for me; some of their songs aren’t bad but Ian Kenny’s voice gets more annoying the more intense and loud it gets (their last single “This Fire” provokes violent urges in me). “Lanterns” gets around this most effectively by only getting louder for a brief middle-eight, and instead offers us a gentle and mildly rousing sing-a-long that builds awkwardly but pleasantly around a melody that’s actually worth singing along to. I should hate this, and that middle-eight bit is weakly disagreeable, but stadium fields and television dramas will be politely illuminated for the next twelve months anyway.
[7]

Alfred Soto: To its credit, it resists the anthemic – even when the boys drop the drums it projects a quiet determination to remain a covert expression of solidarity, if such a thing is possible – but it still sounds like what boarding school band might rehearse for the Big Game. But don’t fret, kids: it sounds just enough like The Shins.
[5]

Brad Shoup: I don’t know where Birds of Tokyo lean in regards to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but once again I’m hearing something devotional here. The video does “Stand Behind the Music” one better in featuring a hip crowd of largely commercial-grade bodies just fucking milling about in a zombified Occupy riff. Assuming there’s something spiritual in their anthemic bent, I could offer you the theory that evangelical action — once bound up in the imagery of warfare — is now draping itself in the raiments of insurgency. Regardless, it’s a dumb look. Birds of Tokyo bring up the rear guard for Positive Jams with crisp 4/4 strummage and absolutely no question or doubt. No cymbals, just kick. No ambiguity, just serenity. And if they hadn’t lashed said serenity to smugness, I could live with it.
[2]

Anthony Easton: Charming and low-key, perhaps because of the accents and the small, slightly jittery instrumental bits in the introduction or the chorus of sighs around a minute or so in. As it gets more complicated musically, it gets less interesting, yet if it was just guitar and voice, it would collapse in its own earnestness. A bit of a tricky trap there. 
[5]

Erick Bieritz: This would play quite nicely amid the pop/rock format’s circled wagons at Middle Of Road. “Lanterns” is a vaguely generational call to some sort of action that is not so specific that it can’t readily be leveraged for introspective television montages and retail purgatory white noise. It’s also dreadful and won’t do much good when the EDM savages come charging over the barricades to scalp the likes of Birds of Tokyo, the Lumineers, and any other milquetoast bearded survivors.
[2]

Scott Mildenhall: After one minute this sounds like it might be going somewhere. After two it still sounds like it might be going somewhere. By the third, nothing has happened. Thirty seconds later, something happens. Then it stops happening. It’s a shame, because this could be great if it wasn’t so pedestrian; as it is, Danny from Embrace needn’t fear for his PRS cheques just yet.
[4]

Patrick St. Michel: Being the sort of band that can make a big, shouty song like “Lanterns” in Australia must be a pretty sweet gig. Birds Of Tokyo can play this at various festivals during the Australian summer…and then be ready to break it out for the sweaty masses north of the equator. It’s tempting to lump this in with groups like Mumford and Sons or Imagine Dragons, but “Lanterns” does a few things better and worse than those groups. The band take their time to get to the payoff instead of constantly bringing it out, but this also sounds a bit too twee for its own good (those bells, man). Also, as great as it is they save the big moment for late, it doesn’t really make the wait worth it.
[5]

Ian Mathers: It’s too long, by which I mean that I found myself enjoying the first 3:30 to a surprising extent before they decided, no, they did need to stick in some sort of crescendo. They didn’t. In fact, the song’s even better before they decide to add the bass drum in at 2:20; before that, there’s a softness to the song that’s very appealing. I know they have a drummer and have to give him something to do, but imagine how much more lovely and distinct the song would be if they didn’t. And if they stopped around 3:30. Decent odds that I’ll get the chorus melody stuck in my head despite the totally generic lyrics, though.
[6]

Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: This collection of namby-pamby niceties sounds like Wings without McCartney involved. Make of that what you will.
[5]

Jer Fairall: Cross-pollinates fun. and Mumford and Sons like the collective wet dream of a thousand record label execs and Grammy voters, but if generic anthems are the order of the day, best to approach them in the form of gently propulsive Edge-like guitars, a shimmer of chimes and a vocalist who can sell broad sentiment without overstating it.
[6]

Crystal Leww: “Lanterns” exists for those of you who wanted something that combines the lifelessness of The Lumineers with the faux-inspiration anthems of fun. (I didn’t.)
[1]