Thursday, December 11, 2014

Death Cab For Cutie - Something About Airplanes (1998)


Best Song: Amputations

Lineup:

Ben Gibbard – Vocals, Guitar, Keyboards
Chris Walla – Guitar, Keyboards, Production
Nick Harmer – Bass
Nathan Good – Drums

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yeah, yeah, I know, I did Death Cab before, but they meet the criteria of being ignored by the WRC, and I'm very comfortable and familiar with them.

When Ben Gibbard and his terrible haircut decided to get together to record some demos as a side project, he didn't expect it to turn into anything serious. He had another band at the time – a power-pop outfit called Pinwheel – and he merely wanted to record some other songs that he'd been working on that wouldn't fit in with his current band. He had so little faith in the project that he named it after an obscure Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band song, but the demo tapes gained a lot of traction and soon he found himself putting together a new band under the name of Death Cab For Cutie, replacing his old one for good.

Something About Airplanes is a deceptive album. The first time you listen to it – maybe the first several times – it will seem like a gloomy glob of nothing, all atmosphere and no real substance, with songs that are impossible to tell apart, dragging along at an agonizingly slow pace. Every song is set to one mode, and that is “depressed and melancholy.” It can be a tough nut to crack, but the more you listen to it, the more the vocal melodies start to pop out at you, and the more intoxicating the atmosphere becomes. The production is brilliant, with the hazy guitars and obfuscated vocals creating the off-kilter melancholy that Death Cab does so well. The only way I can describe it is that Ben Gibbard's voice sounds like it's coming at you from another dimension, or from inside your own mind.

Furthermore, and this is essential to getting into this band, Ben Gibbard's vocal melodies are typically outstanding, and his lovely, sad voice never fails to bring them to life. The instruments are used as more of a textural device than for traditional riffing or soloing, and the textures they create are often gorgeous.

The album is more or less evenly divided into slow moving atmospheric pieces and mid-tempo “rockers”, although Death Cab never really rock out in any traditional sense. Pretty much all of the rockers are winners - “President of What?” has a gripping organ/guitar groove going on, not to mention that descending “Something's got to break you down” refrain that pulls you right in. The fan favorite “Pictures in an Exhibition” is just a typical chunky indie-rocker with an above-average (for the genre) vocal melody, and it's probably the weakest of this group, though still quite good. It's just not as good as the hyper-catchy “Fake Frowns” or especially “Amputations,” with its fantastically simple feedback-y guitar line and the unforgettable “He's unresponsive 'cause you're irresponsible” refrain.

Really, the only songs which let the album down at all fall into the other category. “Sleep Spent” is alright, just a pleasant, pretty, but rather forgettable ballad. This album would be much better off without the other two, though. “”The Face That Launched 1000 Shits” is, first of all, a God awful title for any song. It just kind of plods along with no real purpose, and I don't even get what's with the goofy title - Ben seems to sing “ships” in the song itself and the song clearly refers to the Trojan War. It also features unquestionably the worst lyric in any Death Cab song ever - “You can see I'm not a minor in Asia no more.” Ugh, you cannot be serious. I cringed just typing it. It was apparently written by somebody named Jay Chilcote, the only song in the band's catalogue not at least co-written by Ben Gibbard, and that number should be reduced by one. And finally, “Line of Best Fit” isn't awful, but as a semi-decent atmospheric number, it has no excuse being 7 minutes long. Even if it was trimmed down, it would still be one of the lesser songs on here. Not a great choice for the closer.

Still, let's get back to the positive. The other three remaining tracks are phenomenal. “Champagne from a Paper Cup” combines a hazy guitar line and Ben's slightly drunk vocal melody to create the perfect musical picture of being trashed out of your mind at a party but not enjoying yourself at all. Also, while I'm not a fan of Death Cab's lyrics much in general, and especially not early on, I admit that I do really like the line “I think I'm drunk enough to drive you home now.”

The other two feature some absolutely fantastic build up. “Bend to Squares” opens us up with a lovely combination of a mournful acoustic guitar line and cello, with Ben Gibbard's ethereal voice almost whispering the vocal melody to you. The song gets progressively louder until some electric guitar chords and drums come crashing in, tearing down the musical curtain, and by the time the anthemic “What a way to cut lengthwise” refrain comes in, you'll feel the song has really earned it. No moreso than “Your Bruise,” though, whose distant opening guitar line always brings to mind a church bell tolling on a dark, rainy night for some reason. The song paints a picture of a deeply hidden pain come to light, and does so much better musically (and vocally) than it does lyrically.

Death Cab's debut is one of the strongest albums of their career, but it's also probably the least accessible. As I said, the droning, lethargic guitar atmospherics can really wear you down, and it can be hard to tell the songs apart for a long time. It's actually very similar to Murmur by R.E.M. in that way. It takes a long time to make a distinct impression, but when it does, it gets under your skin deeply. If you can ignore Ben Gibbard's high school level poetry and get enraptured by the sound and the melancholy atmosphere, eventually the brilliant vocal melodies and beautiful instrumental textures will reveal themselves to you. Something About Airplanes ends up being a tough, but highly rewarding listen.

Rating: 13/15

3 comments:

  1. Since they're named after a Bonzo Dog Band song, I was wondering if you've heard anything from them (aside from that particular song).

    Also, I never realized how great a psychological trick a rating is; if it's at the top of the review, I might read the review a bit more lazily, but I read the whole review without even noticing there was no rating until I got to it at the very end.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just that particular song, from the Magical Mystery Tour movie. I've heard their first album is pretty good, so I'll probably check them out sometime.

      I actually made that decision consciously to put the rating at the bottom back when I first did this. I thought about how I would read it, and how if a rating came at the beginning, it makes the words not seem as important. You already got the "important" information up front after all, right? So, yeah, I decided to put those at the end for that very reason.

      Delete
    2. I too only ever heard the song (though not through the MMT film), although I have four of their albums. For me, the most interesting things about the Bonzos is how they were house band for an early version of the Monty Python crew (I love that weird surreal crap) and that two of them were good drinking buddies of Keith Moon (but who wasn't back then; even one of the Pythons was)

      Delete