Plans was a huge commercial success, but while the public ate it up, the critics, while not exactly panning it, gave it very “meh” reviews and declared Death Cab's sell out complete and their career over. There was basically no chance of the critical adulation returning, but Death Cab's best move probably would've been to push back and defy critical expectations even more, showing them that they're going to continue to try new things and evolve no matter what the critics wanted from them. So, naturally, the followup, Narrow Stairs, is easily their laziest album ever, basically sounding like a less good Transatlanticism. The result didn't please anybody – Death Cab fans weren't happy with it, Plans fans weren't happy with it, even Death Cab weren't happy with it, and the critics said “See, I knew it!!”
Death Cab themselves have been very down on this album. Ben Gibbard, referring to the lyrics, says he considers it embarrassing, overly self-pitying, and called it “Death Cab's most depressing album.” That's a ridiculous claim, of course – We Have The Facts is a much more depressing album if nothing else, though he may have a point about the lyrics. I don't really listen to Death Cab for the lyrics, and even if I did, they aren't as bad as all that on this album. Honestly, though, as much as this album is dismissed and as sad as it is to see Death Cab releasing such a very typical pop-rock album that they could've done in their sleep, it's still not bad at all. It's a pretty good pop-rock album, it just doesn't stack up to most of their other output. That doesn't mean they forgot to write good melodies and songs, though.
Well, ok, sometimes they did. The biggest problem with Narrow Stairs is an alarming amount of filler compared to previous albums (except The Photo Album, although nobody will admit it but me). “You Can Do Better Than Me” and “Your New Twin Sized Bed” - whose names speak for themselves on the lyrical content – are strangely clumsy attempts at ballads, something they did so well on the previous album. “Talking Bird” is better, but depending on my mood on any given day, it's either a tear jerker or remarkably boring. For some reason, “The Ice Is Getting Thinner” is something of a fan favorite despite basically being “Talking Bird Part 2” and not being as good as that already questionable ballad. I guess I don't really get Death Cab fans, despite being one myself, since I've pretty much dismissed every fan favorite to this point.
The rest is quite fine, though. It's very by numbers, but there are two tracks where they do try something new, and they're both highlights. The big hit single, “I Will Possess Your Heart,” features an extended astral instrumental opening which sounds more like Pink Floyd than Death Cab, and the song itself is a nicely hooky dark pop song. The other, “Pity and Fear,” is built around a sort of Peter Gabriel-ish tribal rhythm and a tasty, creepy guitar line, with a typically good vocal melody, and ends with a cool guitar riff that reminds me of Black Sabbath of all things.
The opening “Bixby Canyon Bridge” is a nice yearning anthem about the frustration of failing to find spiritual enlightenment, and it's more or less just a somewhat lesser Transatlanticism song with an organ shoved in to remind us that Plans happened. The mid-section is a little bit overlong and tries a little bit too hard to recapture the dreamy atmosphere of past tension building Death Cab instrumental sections, but I still enjoy it, and the rest of the song is good enough that I consider it the best on the album. “No Sunlight” is a super catchy, compact pop song, and “Long Division” is a good post-punkish rocker. “Grapevine Fires” is another one of those Zen-like songs, like “Passenger Seat” or “Brothers on a Hotel Bed,” where not much is happening beyond a minimalist electric piano line, but it still manages to work its way under your skin anyways. And finally, “Cath...” is a fine mid-tempo atmospheric number that wouldn't be out of place on their early albums with a different production style.
In the end, I tend to think quite positively about Narrow Stairs. Sure, it's a disappointment coming from Death Cab, and it's definitely lazy, but it's not like they just lost all of their talent. This is a perfectly fine, pretty good pop-rock album. I'm just used to getting a lot more from Death Cab, but after four phenomenal albums, I can't really get upset that they kind of coasted for one of them, not when it's still a good album that I enjoy just fine. Besides, although their followup still didn't make anybody happy, this wasn't the beginning of a trend, and Death Cab would go on to try new things again in their next album. Narrow Stairs gets a perfectly fine, shiny, optimistic 11.
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