2000's We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes delivered on the promise of You Can Play These Songs with Chords and Something About Airplanes. For once, a band's popularity grew commensurate with its maturation. Despite the heightened attention, singer/songwriter/guitarist Ben Gibbard next let loose Death Cab for Cutie's finest moment, "Photobooth," the lead track on the sparkling Forbidden Love EP. New fans worldwide swooned under its beguiling romantic rise 'n' fall and its lingering, bittersweet, wallet-sized artifact. And though it wouldn't have killed them to include "Photobooth" here -- for its spotless greatness and thematic likeness -- The Photo Album's ten tracks are of the EP's heightened caliber. Gibbard's words screen intriguing mini-films of the mind, stoked by corresponding daydreamy music. An exquisite liaison of the British penchant for ringing, knelling, subconscious guitars, and direct/grittier American drive, the band is tight, evocative, and inventive. Bassist Nick Harmer and drummer Michael Schorr lock in creative rhythmic bases, while Gibbard and Chris Walla's guitar work give the band climactic, cinematic coloring shades. And, in the end, it's Gibbard's remarkable abilities as a writer and singer that are on display most. Each word draws you in via his sweet-guy thoughtful voice. The solo 1:47 opener "Steadier Footing" is merely a starter course, but it feels like an entrée: "And this is the chance I never got/To make a move, but we just talk" is only one measure of the chances/plans/dreams/connections and relationships that have eluded him or fizzled. Reeled in, one is left to look back over one's own smoldering wreckage, of opportunities or attachments lost -- much as "Movie Script Ending"s abrupt turn, "Passing through unconscious states/When I awoke I was on the highway," somehow segues into the couplet, "With your hands on my shoulders/A meaningless movement, a movie script ending." Like "Photobooth," it's a typically sobering, adverse assessment of how unromantic the romanticized can become. That it's a great pop song, arresting in its jerky wobble, is just another point in its, and this LP's, favor. The world needs more superb pop with brains and heart and emotional complexity.
First things first - I feel the need to tag this post with two more songs, for reasons that may become clearer later. And also, I realise that 'Why You'd Want...' makes the opposite point to the one I'm going to, but I like it. Anyway...Artist`: Hard Fi Album: Stars of CCTV Song: Living for the WeekendArtist: They Might Be Giants Album:Flood Song:Your Racist FriendWhoever the Patron Saint of Lo...
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Back in the day, before I became a slave to myspace and buying music off the internet, I didn't care what anyone thought about the bands I loved. I remember listening to Death Cab For Cutie's The Photo Album and not thinking of words like "unfortunately awkward bridge" or "full, grammatically correct sentences". All I cared was that 20th Century Towers was the most heartbreaking song I had ever...
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Hey all,pretty productive day for me so far. A few duplications in Christmas gifts I received allowed me to build up some HMV store credit, which I got around to spending. In exchange for one DVD box set, plus a shiny 2 euro coin, I was able to get 'V For Vendetta', 'Wedding Crashers', 'Bad Boys' (which is one of the most rewatchable action movies I can think of) and 'The Photo Album' by Death ...
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and so my first post on mog...Well, 2006 is coming to a close. Will i miss it? im not quite sure. so many things have happened. id say this may have been the most dramatic year of my life, not that i've lived many. but, oh well. i guess that makes it something to miss, yet im pretty happy a fresh start is coming.i was recently going through some songs in my library and stumbled upon steadier fo...
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Tonight (3/29/08), for 1 hour, cities all around the world will go dark...in celebration of "Earth Hour":http://www12.earthhourus.org/.We will be following suit in the Anderson household...We are inviting friends over, having an early dinner, followed by gaming by candlelight.So moggers...what will you do when the lights go out?
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so last week death cab for cutie sent out a myspace bulletin announcing that in may of 2008 they will be releasing their next studio album. i am muuuuuch excited! though "plans" can't even remotely compare to the sheer awesomeness that are "transatlanticism" and "the photo album", i think it helped solidify their sound. they are both deep and shallow, pithy and pathetic, witty and banal, and...
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So I just got in the mood to hear some Death Cab For Cutie sounds. I've got Plans and Something About Airplanes on my Powerbook but I wanted to hear a song off The Photo Album but alas it's packed along with about 3000 other CDS as I've been moving...But I did find "A Movie Script Ending" at the Barsuk Records site. Cool.And now you can hear it too.http://www.barsuk.com/bands/deathcabforcutie/...
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i've been feeling very much like la doesn't want me here. san francisco is calling me and i'm finding it harder and harder to ignore it. the bay misses me. my beach misses me. even my parents' basement misses me. and la keeps kicking the shit out of me...
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First things first - I feel the need to tag this post with two more songs, for reasons that may become clearer later. And also, I realise that 'Why You'd Want...' makes the opposite point to the one I'm going to, but I like it. Anyway...Artist`: Hard Fi Album: Stars of CCTV Song: Living for the WeekendArtist: They Might Be Giants Album:Flood Song:Your Racist FriendWhoever the Patron Saint of Lo...
More >
Hey all,pretty productive day for me so far. A few duplications in Christmas gifts I received allowed me to build up some HMV store credit, which I got around to spending. In exchange for one DVD box set, plus a shiny 2 euro coin, I was able to get 'V For Vendetta', 'Wedding Crashers', 'Bad Boys' (which is one of the most rewatchable action movies I can think of) and 'The Photo Album' by Death ...
More >
A song from a band I really like.Be Well.
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on saturday my tickets to death cab's show next month (!!!) came in the mail as well as a poster i ordered. it's from ben's solo tour last summer. yay! when the tour was happening, i was driving out to virginia for an internship and had planned to stop in nashville to see him play, but i left later than planned and ended up in a motel in albuquerque (bleh) instead of hearing one of my favorites...
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Back in the day, before I became a slave to myspace and buying music off the internet, I didn't care what anyone thought about the bands I loved. I remember listening to Death Cab For Cutie's The Photo Album and not thinking of words like "unfortunately awkward bridge" or "full, grammatically correct sentences". All I cared was that 20th Century Towers was the most heartbreaking song I had ever...
More >
It's perfectly obvious that when anyone thinks of the indie poster child, Death Cab for Cutie comes to mind.Even though I guess that this means they are not 'technically' indie, considering the whole major label debut, I still absolutely adore them and still, kind of regretfully, view my music taste as kind of elite.But you seriously can't blame me when the people around me are total Fergie adv...
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and so my first post on mog...Well, 2006 is coming to a close. Will i miss it? im not quite sure. so many things have happened. id say this may have been the most dramatic year of my life, not that i've lived many. but, oh well. i guess that makes it something to miss, yet im pretty happy a fresh start is coming.i was recently going through some songs in my library and stumbled upon steadier fo...
More >
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 "The Photo Album")
