Patrick
02-06-2003, 04:12 PM
Here's the bio from the last (brilliant) record, "Mass Romantic", released on Mint:
The New Pornographers are a super-group, as deserving of the tag as Vancouver — or any city across the land — is likely to produce. Take a great singer, peerless songwriter and stunning studio arranger in Carl Newman, and remove him from the complex, overwrought easy listening environment of his band, Zumpano. Add to it Dan Bejar, a/k/a Destroyer, a musician-about-town and brilliant songwriter in his own right, whose own work has established him as a reluctant hero, an underground underdog actually worthy of the spotlight he’s anxious to shun. Add a third singer in the distinct pipes of Mint’s sonic bombshell, Neko Case; a fourth voice takes the form of Limblifter drummer Kurt Dahle, who contributes from behind the kit to the backing chorus. Engineer, bassist, member of Nardwuar’s The Evaporators and Thee Goblins John Collins and keyboardist Blaine Thurier round out the line-up.
It all began in 1996, with a name. Zumpano had just released their excellent sophomore effort, Goin’ Through Changes. Yet Carl, ever restless, had other plans. “I always wanted to be the new sometings,” he says. “The New Pornographers had a good ring to it.”
In its initial stages, the New Pornographers were more of a good idea than a working band. With so many other projects on the go — including Carl’s participation in Vancouver’s Superconductor, whose magnum opus Bastardsong was released in the summer of ’96 — the band began slowly, in fits and starts. Even Carl’s explanation of where the name came from was after the fact. “I didn’t find out until recently that it actually had some kind of meaning,” he admits. “[Televangelist] Jimmy Swaggart wrote a book called Music: The New Pornography. Holy shit, it fits so perfectly. Ever since, I tell people ‘Jimmy Swaggart said music was the new pornography. The New Pornographers are merely musicians.’ It’s completely innocent, and pooh-poohs people who say ‘what an offensive name you have.’”
Their first rehearsal took place early in 1997; their first show took place more than a year later. Sporadic shows occurred, all in Vancouver, highlighted by a 1998 peformance at the Good Jacket vintage clothing store with Thee Goblins and Bossanova, and a mid-2000 gig with Optigonally Yours and Thingy at the Brickyard. Finally, in October 2000, the band released their debut, Mass Romantic. “A long road,” Carl laughs, “but there were many, many naps along the way.”
To those outside a group of tape-circulating friends in Vancouver, the New Pornographers were announced to the world earlier in 2000 on the Mint Records release called The Good Jacket Presents Vancouver Special, a compilation to benefit the charity A Loving Spoonful. The track, “Letter From An Occupant,” caused an immediate stir of excitement amongst anyone who heard it —_from campus/community radio programmers to John Sakamoto of “Anti Hit List” to Edge 102. A driving rock song — “more straightforward than anything I’ve ever done,” Carl says — it featured epic, improbably soaring vocals from Neko Case, with chugging guitars and backing woo-woo vocals aplenty, a rock tour de force.
Neko didn’t even know the song before she arrived to sing on the recording. “Carl said, ‘Sing it as cold and as heartless as you possibly can. You are a robot.’ It’s awesome not to be involved [in the writing process],” she continues with relief. “I go in and do what they say — I’m just a total puppet in this band, and it feels great.”
The band completed four songs in 1998, including “Letter From An Occupant,” but life got in the way. Neko moved from Vancouver, eventually landing in Chicago where she now resides; Dan completed and released two Destroyer records since; Blaine Thurier wrote and directed a film called Low Self Esteem Girl (in which both Newman and Bejar appear) that was accepted to the Toronto International Film Festival (one of a select few digital films to be invited); John was occupied running JC/DC studios (along with partner David Carswell), recording such bands as Vancouver Nights, Destroyer, The Evaporators, Thee Goblins and others, and playing in his other bands (The Evaporators and Thee Goblins, and tour-bassist for The Smugglers); and the band’s first drummer, Fisher Rose, decided he was over-extending himself and quit. Carl toured with Zumpano and as one of Neko’s backing band “Boyfriends” and the four songs languished in limbo. When Carl struck upon the idea of inviting Limblifter drummer Kurt Dahle to replace Fisher, and with prodding from different quarters — both band members and fans who’d heard those early recordings — the New Pornographers cranked up, and recording began again last year at JC/DC studios with John at the knob-twiddling helm._
If Neko is a puppet in the New Pornographers, there’s little doubt who the puppeteer is. Even Dan, whose own songwriting and musical contributions to the group are substantial, downplays his role in the New Pornographers process. “Once in a while I’d look up from the computer solitaire game and say ‘Hey, that sounds good.’ You can hear my voice chiming in, I pound on the piano here and there,” he says modestly. When told that Carl likes to downplay his own role, emphasising Dan’s brilliant melodic and musical vision, he stands firm. “I think you can trust me on this one,” Dan says._
This kind of friendly banter demonstrates how close the whole band is, but keyboardist Blaine Thurier’s comments reveal more truth about the working process. “Dan’s a lot more easygoing about how the song evolves. Carl can be a little more, um, specific about what he wants it to sound like.”
Had Mint Records not given the band a deadline, Carl would still be in the studio, leaning over engineer John’s shoulder and saying “Yeah, that should be up,” or “We gotta have a lot of that,” digging through various instruments, asking, “What can we put some pump organ on?” to no one in particular. “Even when it was finished, I was thinking ‘Geez, I’d really like to remix those two songs,’” Carl admits now. “It’s kind of hard to let go of that, but I have to remind myself, what are the chances of me being completely happy and satisfied with anything? Maybe it’s possible, but those are the people who spend six months mixing their record. I don’t have the time and money to do it. You could go crazy doing that kind of thing.” He pauses. “I’m willing to take that chance.”
“I don’t think it’s a real tyrannical vision that he has,” says Dan for clarification. “He’s just less lax than I am — it’s not tyranny, it’s just a lack of passivity.” For fans familiar with both Zumpano and Destroyer, it’s not difficult to figure out who wrote what; Dan’s New Pornographers contributions are just more arranged, more elaborate than the treatment they might get with his more straightforward Destroyer band. “I trust [Carl and John] implicitly and their musical ideas and instincts are solid,” he continues. “In a lot of ways I presented up the songs and said run with it. I don’t have the knack or the patience for studio orchestration.”
Carl is an equal partner in this New Pornographers mutual appreciation society, and his excitement at having Dan as a bandmate is palpable. “A New Pornographers song by Dan is one that I just steal,” Carl laughs. “Sometimes I’m mad about the songs that I’ve missed. I went to see Dan play solo late last year, and heard a couple of new songs that were really good. Then I realised that those songs could be in my band — it was a very interesting feeling. That’s how ‘Jackie’ ended up an NP song.
“It’s a weird relationship when dealing with Dan’s songs in the New Pornographers,” Carl continues, “because I tend to mangle them quite a bit, which I love doing. I think they end up coming out a lot different when they go through the NP meat grinder. I don’t know how far I can push that before he attacks back. It’s not really stealing though — we’re both in the band!”
The pedigree of the band’s individual members notwithstanding, no one could have anticipated the impact the album would have at the end of 2000 and into 2001. Reaction to the New Pornographers has been steadily accelerating, from well before the release of Mass Romantic to the present. Campus/community and non-commercial radio picked up on the insanely catchy album in earnest, and Mass Romantic topped the radio charts throughout the winter. Raves and hyperbolic gushes seemed to be non-stop, both at home and internationally, with such esteemed publications as the New York Times (one of 2000’s “Worthwhile Albums Most People Missed”), Q, Mojo, Spin, Rolling Stone, Alternative Press, CMJ (one of “This Week’s Essential New Music”), USA News And World Report, No Depression, Tower Records Pulse, Entertainment Weekly, Now, eye, Exclaim, Chart, Vice and myriad others sitting up and taking notice._
In September, before the album’s release date, and ostensibly to help promote Blaine’s film Low Self Esteem Girl, the New Pornographers were invited to perform at the Citytv “Festival Schmooze” event — one of a very select few bands to appear at this huge Toronto International Film Festival shindig (the others were Danko Jones and Deborah Cox) — and were broadcast live on Star and Citytv.
In November, coinciding with the band’s first tour — and its first batch of shows with Neko as a regular participant — The New Pornographers were the cover feature for Toronto’s Exclaim Magazine, Canada’s largest-circulation free music monthly. The tour took them to Calgary, Edmonton, Victoria and Seattle — and press and acclaim followed wherever they went — as well as an ultra-chic record release party in Vancouver at the Starfish Room._
[continued in next post]
The New Pornographers are a super-group, as deserving of the tag as Vancouver — or any city across the land — is likely to produce. Take a great singer, peerless songwriter and stunning studio arranger in Carl Newman, and remove him from the complex, overwrought easy listening environment of his band, Zumpano. Add to it Dan Bejar, a/k/a Destroyer, a musician-about-town and brilliant songwriter in his own right, whose own work has established him as a reluctant hero, an underground underdog actually worthy of the spotlight he’s anxious to shun. Add a third singer in the distinct pipes of Mint’s sonic bombshell, Neko Case; a fourth voice takes the form of Limblifter drummer Kurt Dahle, who contributes from behind the kit to the backing chorus. Engineer, bassist, member of Nardwuar’s The Evaporators and Thee Goblins John Collins and keyboardist Blaine Thurier round out the line-up.
It all began in 1996, with a name. Zumpano had just released their excellent sophomore effort, Goin’ Through Changes. Yet Carl, ever restless, had other plans. “I always wanted to be the new sometings,” he says. “The New Pornographers had a good ring to it.”
In its initial stages, the New Pornographers were more of a good idea than a working band. With so many other projects on the go — including Carl’s participation in Vancouver’s Superconductor, whose magnum opus Bastardsong was released in the summer of ’96 — the band began slowly, in fits and starts. Even Carl’s explanation of where the name came from was after the fact. “I didn’t find out until recently that it actually had some kind of meaning,” he admits. “[Televangelist] Jimmy Swaggart wrote a book called Music: The New Pornography. Holy shit, it fits so perfectly. Ever since, I tell people ‘Jimmy Swaggart said music was the new pornography. The New Pornographers are merely musicians.’ It’s completely innocent, and pooh-poohs people who say ‘what an offensive name you have.’”
Their first rehearsal took place early in 1997; their first show took place more than a year later. Sporadic shows occurred, all in Vancouver, highlighted by a 1998 peformance at the Good Jacket vintage clothing store with Thee Goblins and Bossanova, and a mid-2000 gig with Optigonally Yours and Thingy at the Brickyard. Finally, in October 2000, the band released their debut, Mass Romantic. “A long road,” Carl laughs, “but there were many, many naps along the way.”
To those outside a group of tape-circulating friends in Vancouver, the New Pornographers were announced to the world earlier in 2000 on the Mint Records release called The Good Jacket Presents Vancouver Special, a compilation to benefit the charity A Loving Spoonful. The track, “Letter From An Occupant,” caused an immediate stir of excitement amongst anyone who heard it —_from campus/community radio programmers to John Sakamoto of “Anti Hit List” to Edge 102. A driving rock song — “more straightforward than anything I’ve ever done,” Carl says — it featured epic, improbably soaring vocals from Neko Case, with chugging guitars and backing woo-woo vocals aplenty, a rock tour de force.
Neko didn’t even know the song before she arrived to sing on the recording. “Carl said, ‘Sing it as cold and as heartless as you possibly can. You are a robot.’ It’s awesome not to be involved [in the writing process],” she continues with relief. “I go in and do what they say — I’m just a total puppet in this band, and it feels great.”
The band completed four songs in 1998, including “Letter From An Occupant,” but life got in the way. Neko moved from Vancouver, eventually landing in Chicago where she now resides; Dan completed and released two Destroyer records since; Blaine Thurier wrote and directed a film called Low Self Esteem Girl (in which both Newman and Bejar appear) that was accepted to the Toronto International Film Festival (one of a select few digital films to be invited); John was occupied running JC/DC studios (along with partner David Carswell), recording such bands as Vancouver Nights, Destroyer, The Evaporators, Thee Goblins and others, and playing in his other bands (The Evaporators and Thee Goblins, and tour-bassist for The Smugglers); and the band’s first drummer, Fisher Rose, decided he was over-extending himself and quit. Carl toured with Zumpano and as one of Neko’s backing band “Boyfriends” and the four songs languished in limbo. When Carl struck upon the idea of inviting Limblifter drummer Kurt Dahle to replace Fisher, and with prodding from different quarters — both band members and fans who’d heard those early recordings — the New Pornographers cranked up, and recording began again last year at JC/DC studios with John at the knob-twiddling helm._
If Neko is a puppet in the New Pornographers, there’s little doubt who the puppeteer is. Even Dan, whose own songwriting and musical contributions to the group are substantial, downplays his role in the New Pornographers process. “Once in a while I’d look up from the computer solitaire game and say ‘Hey, that sounds good.’ You can hear my voice chiming in, I pound on the piano here and there,” he says modestly. When told that Carl likes to downplay his own role, emphasising Dan’s brilliant melodic and musical vision, he stands firm. “I think you can trust me on this one,” Dan says._
This kind of friendly banter demonstrates how close the whole band is, but keyboardist Blaine Thurier’s comments reveal more truth about the working process. “Dan’s a lot more easygoing about how the song evolves. Carl can be a little more, um, specific about what he wants it to sound like.”
Had Mint Records not given the band a deadline, Carl would still be in the studio, leaning over engineer John’s shoulder and saying “Yeah, that should be up,” or “We gotta have a lot of that,” digging through various instruments, asking, “What can we put some pump organ on?” to no one in particular. “Even when it was finished, I was thinking ‘Geez, I’d really like to remix those two songs,’” Carl admits now. “It’s kind of hard to let go of that, but I have to remind myself, what are the chances of me being completely happy and satisfied with anything? Maybe it’s possible, but those are the people who spend six months mixing their record. I don’t have the time and money to do it. You could go crazy doing that kind of thing.” He pauses. “I’m willing to take that chance.”
“I don’t think it’s a real tyrannical vision that he has,” says Dan for clarification. “He’s just less lax than I am — it’s not tyranny, it’s just a lack of passivity.” For fans familiar with both Zumpano and Destroyer, it’s not difficult to figure out who wrote what; Dan’s New Pornographers contributions are just more arranged, more elaborate than the treatment they might get with his more straightforward Destroyer band. “I trust [Carl and John] implicitly and their musical ideas and instincts are solid,” he continues. “In a lot of ways I presented up the songs and said run with it. I don’t have the knack or the patience for studio orchestration.”
Carl is an equal partner in this New Pornographers mutual appreciation society, and his excitement at having Dan as a bandmate is palpable. “A New Pornographers song by Dan is one that I just steal,” Carl laughs. “Sometimes I’m mad about the songs that I’ve missed. I went to see Dan play solo late last year, and heard a couple of new songs that were really good. Then I realised that those songs could be in my band — it was a very interesting feeling. That’s how ‘Jackie’ ended up an NP song.
“It’s a weird relationship when dealing with Dan’s songs in the New Pornographers,” Carl continues, “because I tend to mangle them quite a bit, which I love doing. I think they end up coming out a lot different when they go through the NP meat grinder. I don’t know how far I can push that before he attacks back. It’s not really stealing though — we’re both in the band!”
The pedigree of the band’s individual members notwithstanding, no one could have anticipated the impact the album would have at the end of 2000 and into 2001. Reaction to the New Pornographers has been steadily accelerating, from well before the release of Mass Romantic to the present. Campus/community and non-commercial radio picked up on the insanely catchy album in earnest, and Mass Romantic topped the radio charts throughout the winter. Raves and hyperbolic gushes seemed to be non-stop, both at home and internationally, with such esteemed publications as the New York Times (one of 2000’s “Worthwhile Albums Most People Missed”), Q, Mojo, Spin, Rolling Stone, Alternative Press, CMJ (one of “This Week’s Essential New Music”), USA News And World Report, No Depression, Tower Records Pulse, Entertainment Weekly, Now, eye, Exclaim, Chart, Vice and myriad others sitting up and taking notice._
In September, before the album’s release date, and ostensibly to help promote Blaine’s film Low Self Esteem Girl, the New Pornographers were invited to perform at the Citytv “Festival Schmooze” event — one of a very select few bands to appear at this huge Toronto International Film Festival shindig (the others were Danko Jones and Deborah Cox) — and were broadcast live on Star and Citytv.
In November, coinciding with the band’s first tour — and its first batch of shows with Neko as a regular participant — The New Pornographers were the cover feature for Toronto’s Exclaim Magazine, Canada’s largest-circulation free music monthly. The tour took them to Calgary, Edmonton, Victoria and Seattle — and press and acclaim followed wherever they went — as well as an ultra-chic record release party in Vancouver at the Starfish Room._
[continued in next post]