Published on Oct 3, 2005
A.C. (Carl) Newman treats each song like a piece of luggage. And
on
Twin Cinema, the newest release from The New Pornographers,
Newman packs so much stuff into each song that each track threatens
to burst out of its confines.
Singers volley off lyrical lines to each other, dramatic music
shifts bring beautiful choruses to an abrupt end and lyrics come
off more as riddles than straightforward confessionals — all
within a span of three minutes.
If you were too young to ‘get’ the Pixies during their first
go-around in the ’80s and early ’90s, you would be hard pressed to
find a better band that can utilize the power of a great
three-minute pop song than The New Pornographers. And to Newman’s
credit, he does this despite the fact that the majority of the
members of this supergroup have successful careers either heading
other bands (guitarist Dan Bejar heads the band Destroyer) or as a
solo artist (singer Neko Case).
The Pornographers’ first two albums,
Mass Romantic and
Electric Version, were great collections of pop gems that
were near-perfect summer soundtrack albums. Unfortunately, each
album had two or three songs that were catchy to the point of
annoyance. To add to this frustration, both albums seemed like
great collections of songs but each failed to sound like a true
‘album.’
That’s not the case with
Twin Cinema. The album’s opening title track features a
guitar riff that practically wires itself into the listener’s
central nervous system that brought to mind Beck’s “Devil’s
Haircut.” When Newman shouts in a high-pitched, giddy voice, “Lead
the charging of armies into war, yeah!” you get the feeling like
Twin Cinema is going to be a more ambitious recording than
its predecessors.
One of the pressures of leading off with such a strong track is
the listener has a tendency to want to listen to that track again,
setting up the next one for disappointment. Not the case for “The
Bones Of An Idol.” The album eases its way into its first ballad
and Case’s voice automatically holds your attention. Newman’s piano
and Bejar’s breezy guitar work give Case’s vocals plenty of room to
skate around the instrumentation.
Perhaps sensing that Case may jump ship after the touring for
Twin Cinema ends, Newman brings another singer into the
Pornographers fold with Kathryn Calder. While the songs that are
fronted by Case have her stamps all over them (the aforementioned
“The Bones Of An Idol” and the weary “These Are The Fables”),
Calder’s voice is strong enough to hold up with Case’s on the duet
“Three Or Four;” strong enough that most listeners will have
trouble distinguishing one vocalist from the other.
If there is an ‘annoying pop song’ in the bunch, it would go to
“Broken Breads.” Like on previous New Pornographers releases and on
Newman’s solo work
The Slow Wonder, the lyrics veer into ‘too clever for their
own good’ territory (e.g. “Who was I to come between a whore and
her money? Yes there is a war / boys versus girls / clowns versus
their curls.” Newman’s falsetto breakout of a “la la la” chorus
doesn’t help matters either. Fortunately, the last quarter of
Twin Cinema makes “Broken Breads” a mere trip-up and not a
momentum killer.
“Stacked Crooked” may not be the finale that “Miss Teen
Wordpower” was on
Electric Version, but it’s an equally compelling closer.
Bejar’s hammering guitars match perfectly with Kurt Dahle’s
drumming (perhaps the most underrated member of the Pornographers).
Like the rest of
Twin Cinema, the lyrics are moodier and headier than their
previous albums, but the music makes the lyrics go down easy, even
if you don’t know the context of the song.
The listener leaves
Twin Cinema exhilarated and most likely wanting to hit the
‘repeat’ button. In the age of the iPod, it’s refreshing to see
that there still is a place for ‘whole’ albums like
Twin Cinema. Ironically, one of the best ‘whole’ albums of
the year comes from a disjointed band that excels at putting an
album’s worth of hooks into each single.