Newman thinks a lot about his work. He's very self-conscious about how he executes an almost apathetic, before-and-after, wildly free-association songwriting technique, and about the very crucial role his audience plays in what's (in theory) a work of art that stands on its own ("The card you're dealt by the crowd goes wild" - significant, yet seemingly written from a mood of detached caprice)
A car-accident, or a crazy mechanical machine fueled and powered by electrical blood which comes suddenly crashing into your life, strikes me as suitable for the ethos he's going for, and also as a suitable characterization of the band itself. It's a phenomenally over-powered, well-produced album by a super-group from Vancouver that got huge at a time when Americans were reacting to the artificial excesses of the late 90s by fixating either on ostentatiously "Indie" groups like Death Cab for Cutie (who ultimately insisted that they never claimed to be "indie" in the first place) or relapsing into gritty Garage-revivalism (starting with the Strokes and leading to the early Black Keys and White Stripes).
His message is that you sort of half-consciously assign your own significance to the words based on whatever it is you need to get out of the songs, maybe something that you're missing in your life ("make believe you are an only child; here are the clothes, please put them on") and he and the band just channel that shit straight at you for all they're worth. That's their job. You bought the album and you're responsible for the consequences, which is empowering, and yet you'll only be able to enjoy it "just as long as it sounds lost, streaming out of the magnets"
:) More importantly: every time they sing "Still To Come" it calls to mind "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" for me. What can you say? It's just totally perfect.
Newman thinks a lot about his work. He's very self-conscious about how he executes an almost apathetic, before-and-after, wildly free-association songwriting technique, and about the very crucial role his audience plays in what's (in theory) a work of art that stands on its own ("The card you're dealt by the crowd goes wild" - significant, yet seemingly written from a mood of detached caprice)
A car-accident, or a crazy mechanical machine fueled and powered by electrical blood which comes suddenly crashing into your life, strikes me as suitable for the ethos he's going for, and also as a suitable characterization of the band itself. It's a phenomenally over-powered, well-produced album by a super-group from Vancouver that got huge at a time when Americans were reacting to the artificial excesses of the late 90s by fixating either on ostentatiously "Indie" groups like Death Cab for Cutie (who ultimately insisted that they never claimed to be "indie" in the first place) or relapsing into gritty Garage-revivalism (starting with the Strokes and leading to the early Black Keys and White Stripes).
His message is that you sort of half-consciously assign your own significance to the words based on whatever it is you need to get out of the songs, maybe something that you're missing in your life ("make believe you are an only child; here are the clothes, please put them on") and he and the band just channel that shit straight at you for all they're worth. That's their job. You bought the album and you're responsible for the consequences, which is empowering, and yet you'll only be able to enjoy it "just as long as it sounds lost, streaming out of the magnets"
:) More importantly: every time they sing "Still To Come" it calls to mind "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" for me. What can you say? It's just totally perfect.