Earn This

Everybody wish Colton a most wonderful birthday. Your present can be reading some of his wonderful posts.

“My body feels young, but my mind is very old” – Noel Gallagher

Rating: 4 stars (out of five)

Arriving on the heels of the definitive Domestica, The Ugly Organ finds emo rockers Cursive perched on the edge of stardom—and that doesn’t sit well with them.  Organ is an album full of lamentations not just of pain, but of pain expressed in art.  Domestica was the album to listen to after a break-up or divorce; the first half of Ugly Organ explores what it means to turn those feelings into songs, before launching back into the personal agony that propels the second half.  It all makes for an unorthodox, involving listen that we’ve come to expect from the band.

Ugly Organ opens with the prototypical throwaway first cut (the first hint the record will be more flexible than its nine-song predecessor) but starts in earnest with “Some Red-Handed Sleight of Hand” and “Art is Hard,” which barely give the listener time to catch his breath in between cathartic shouts.  Ugly Organ could use more of those songs, though, as it teeters back and forth between punk charges and calmer fare.  Midtempo “The Recluse,” following the aforementioned pair, isn’t bad, but the meaningless “Herald! Frankenstein” is.  And both “The Butcher” and “Gentleman Caller” are succeeded by songs that don’t match their intensity.

The melodies of Ugly Organ are a hair below those of Domestica, thus requiring repeated listens to get to the core of the songs, the best of which restlessly shift their dynamics musically and blend together their lyrical themes. “Butcher the Song” fluctuates expertly from quietude to fury throughout, whereas the gentle and lovely outro of “Gentleman Caller” is hardly recognizable compared to the compelling thrash of the beginning. 

Lyrically, especially on “Hand,” “Art,” and “Butcher,” what’s so compelling is the way frontman Tim Kasher blurs together the line between artistic and personal feelings.  “Try and fail and try again / The comfort of repetition / Keep churning out those hits / Till it’s all the same old shit,” he exclaims on “Hand,” whereas “Butcher” addresses a lover:  “Rub it in / In your dumb lyrics / Yeah, that’s the time and place to wring out your bullshit / And each album I get shit on a little more / Who’s Tim latest whore?”  When he cries “I can’t forget what’s been said / And this guilt I can’t shed / It still rings in my ears” he sounds wholly committed to the material, as though he’s reliving it at that very moment—the kind of intense Cursive moment that few do better.   

Kasher dominates the album more so than Domestica, which had a more consistent musical palette.  The success of the slower fare in the middle is inconsistent, while “Bloody Murderer” and “Sierra” are standard punk charges, albeit with strong choruses.  But anyone doubting their creativity will eat his words after the closing number, which, quite simply, comes out of nowhere.  Generally, when a band writes one long song for an album, it mirrors the others in sound and tone (e.g.: Death Cab’s “Transatlanticism”), but “Staying Alive” shelves Cursive’s bitterness and raucous energy in favor of an anthem as grand and majestic as anything U2 ever recorded.  The middle section, when the drums start to pound and Kasher and fellow guitarist Ted Stevens alternate between thick blasts of noise and Placebo-style shimmering licks and Gretta Cohn’s cello provides a melodic underpinning as Kasher belts “I’m stayin’ aliiiiiiiiiive,” marks a new high point for the band—even if the song, as a whole, could probably use a few minutes off the end.

“I’m writing songs to entertain / But these people, they just want pain,” Kasher sings on “Butcher.”  With Cursive, sometimes one is the other.

Rating: 2 stars (out of five)

All bands are indebted to others from the past, but there are some who seem unavoidably linked to one particular influence.  Interpol is one such case, as one can’t ever read more than about two lines of a review without hearing the name Joy Division pop up.  They have been an integral band in the post-punk/new-wave revival of the 2000s, but while bands such as Franz Ferdinand and The Arctic Monkeys have leaned towards a danceable version of the latter, Interpol tries to stick firmly in the post-punk, Joy Division-esque sound.

The problem with this, though, is that, while they do sound like Joy Division, they don’t really sound like Joy Division.  The comparisons are not terribly misguided, but Interpol simply lacks the sonic innovation, lyrical depth, and sheer originality of their forefathers.  Joy Division was always intensely dramatic; yet Turn on the Bright Lights, Interpol’s widely-praised debut album, lacks sufficient dramatic heft–the critical failing.  The album sounds too slight, too small, too superficial for its dark sound, and lead singer Paul Banks’s lyrics veer towards amateurish.

All of this contributes towards the listener wanting to experience Bright Lights as a poppier version of post-punk, but that goal is ruined by the utter lack of melody found on the album.  Banks is trying to force a melody on songs like “Obstacle 1,” “Say Hello to the Angels,” and “Obstacle 2,” but there’s nothing there.  Even a pretty ending, such as that of “Roland,” is ruined by the horribly muddled rest of the song.  In short, Interpol are caught in no-man’s land, too tentative to approach the starkly dramatic heights of their idols but too nondescript and amelodic to produce something more casually enjoyable.

Though Interpol’s sound is suitably “dark,” it’s not foreboding and overwhelming the way Joy Division’s is.  One reason for this difference, perhaps, lies in the efforts of Banks and fellow guitarist Daniel Kessler.  The beginning of opener “Untitled” sounds like Explosions in the Sky; at other times (“PDA”) the guitar parts recall Coldplay.  In other words, the icy, oppressive, spacious style of JD’s Bernard Albrecht gets pushed aside in favor of more modern styles that don’t fit the rest of the band’s sound.  It’s this critical distinction that is partially responsible for the insignificant feel of too much of the album.

The most frustrating track is “NYC,” which starts off pretty but is soon muddled behind a weak chorus too often repeated, poor and incomplete lyrics, and an overall feeling that we don’t need to take the song seriously enough.  Banks’s lyrics in particular grate; he claims that he’s tired of being lonely, yet someone who did everything for him did not impress him.  Such a seeming contradiction might be possible to understand with more explanation; but otherwise, we’re simply left confused.  

I couldn’t ever shake that feeling with Turn on the Bright Lights that, by sometime around the eighth song, it all started to blur together—similarly amelodic songs, with a vague undercurrent of darkness but no distinction or muscle.  Interpol simply doesn’t possess the musical originality to make up for its other flaws.

Twenty-five percent of the songs on Three Days Grace’s debut album ended up Top-5 singles.

Twenty-five percent of the songs on Three Days Grace’s sophomore album ended up Top-5 singles.

Do we understand each other?  There is no room to question the credentials of Three Days Grace.  As Canada’s premier alternative-metal missionaries, they bring the rasp in their voices, guitars, and outlook.

Last month saw the release of album number three: Life Starts Now.  The single “Break” is holding steady at #7 in its 6th week on the charts.  If it rises no higher, is that a letdown?  Would you say the guys are losing their touch?  To even ask the question reinforces how impressive their career has been from the very outset.  And no, it’s not a letdown.

Since Barry Stock was recruited in 2006 to relieve singer Adam Gontier of lead guitar duties, the band has been a quartet, and their increase in number has continued to represent an increase in sonic energy.  Life Starts Now shows not only meatier arrangements – the kind of rock music that expands to rattle every corner of a room – but also technical improvement on the part of each musician.  Focus on their craft has enabled more engaging drumwork and widened the range of pitch and timbre accessed during guitar solos.  Even the bass, normally the bands weakness, has advanced to a level of competence.

Minor deviations from the normal songwriting framework make themselves known without disrupting the consistency of the band’s corpus.  Odd meters are subtly present and there is a greater emphasis on solo work than on previous offerings.  Still, verses and bridges are right where you expect them to be, you can scream along to every chorus, and an iconic guitar hook remains the raging heart of every song.

Two probable attempts at ballads remind us (and hopefully remind Jive Records) why the self-titled album didn’t have any.  “Lost in You” simply isn’t believable, as an honest Gontier can’t hide the anger that composes his soul despite lyrics bordering on sensitive and clean guitars resolving suspended 6ths into warm-and-fuzzy major triads.  The listener is given more credit by “Last to Know” as unplugged strings and a piano lead us through a tale of depression springing from frustration without hope.

Three Days Grace has a formula that works.  Life Starts Now shows an increase in talent with no drop in raw appeal.  By this time next year the hard rockers may have another set of Top-5 singles for their collection.

At the moment, there is a peripheral matter that catches my interest.  Maybe the aging and unchanging sound of the band concerns Jive, maybe Three Days Grace is trying to compensate for the recession, or maybe the guys just had a cool idea and made it happen.  For whatever reason, the band’s website is advertising a colorful variety of options for purchasing their new record.

For the iTunes-fed, blossoming young gorger of all things mainstream, “exclusive behind the scenes video downloads” are packaged with the digital download to entice a purchase directly from the website rather than through, oh, I don’t know, BitTorrent, which tends to be cheaper.

For the collector who doesn’t roll with headphones growing out of his pocket and around his ears like ivy, a hard cd can be ordered – again, with bonus media as thanks for cutting out the middle man.

For real fans, the kind who come out to shows and tell their friends about Three Days Grace, a limited-edition t-shirt can be shipped along with the album.

Beyond that, things get interesting.  The “Deluxe Package” (now sold out) is priced at $60 and includes a pile of swag – half physical, half digital – compelling enough to merit serious consideration even from teenagers living on an allowance or fast-food wages.  Towering above at $100 is the “Super Deluxe Package,” replete with bonuses from a cd signed and numbered by the band to a “smashed piece of a Three Days Grace guitar.”  That’s as exclusive as it gets.

I recently saw a similar gradient of offers posted by progressive rock outfit Spock’s Beard.  In an attempt to raise funds for their self-released tenth album, they put the album on presale before going to studio to record it.  Merchandise options included packages similar to those marketed by Three Days Grace, headed by a $200 “Ultra Package” with an intangible premier benefit:

“…And finally, [you will get] your name written into the lyrics of a new Spock’s Beard song.  This track will include a vocal section where your name (or someone you choose) will be sung by the band.  This will be a full band, fully-produced song that requires a long list of names be sung as part of the lyric.”

Deals like these intrigue me.  Have other groups been making crazy offers and selling their new releases in such intense tiered packages?  Ten years from now, if the economy is back to prime form, will we still see offers like these for the most ravenous fans?

The answers likely depend on whether the music industry follows overall market fluctuations or diverges as the onward march of the digital age changes the game.  Personally, I’ve got my fingers crossed that this is a trend with some wings, ready to take off.

Silent Alarm (2005) – 3 1/2 stars

A Weekend in the City (2007) – 4 1/2 stars

Intimacy (2008) – 4 stars

Bloc Party exploded right out of the gate in 2005 as one of the most acclaimed bands in this decade’s post-punk revival phase.  Their debut album, Silent Alarm, managed the tricky feat of garnering both critical and commercial praise, placing them at the top of the ranks that included Franz Ferdinand, Interpol, The Arctic Monkeys, and others.  Headed by frontman Kele Okereke’s engaging voice and atypical deftness with wordplay, this multi-national band transcends their new-wave and post-punk influences to create a sound thoroughly 21st century.

Indeed, they sound fresh, edgy, and modern on Alarm.  The wonderfully vibrant opening duo of “Like Eating Glass” and “Helicopter” captivate from the start, Matt Tong’s staccato drumming propelling the first and Russell Lissack’s stuttering, descending guitar line the second.  Yet several songs on the album titillate with untapped potential; overall, the ballads (“This Modern Love,” “Compliments”) fare better than the rockers, which tend to meander as the album progresses.  Future efforts would be enhanced by Okereke’s improving lyrics and a more focused attention to songcraft.  

Sophomore effort A Weekend in the City diverged from Silent Alarm and didn’t impress critics.  Never mind that, for it’s a soaring, incredibly atmospheric, often soothing work that proves BP aren’t just concerned with lighting up a club.  The instruments less spiky and more haunting, the production beautifully dense and lush, the vocals lovelier, Weekend makes it hard to think of Bloc Party as a post-punk revivalist band at all.  Swirling, heavenly choruses on songs like “Waiting for the 7:18” and “The Prayer” ensnare the listener, and the band pulls back for a couple of magnificent, wintry interludes on the closing duo of “Sunday” and “SRXT.”   

Frontman Kele Okereke provides touching vocals in “On” and contributes fine lyrics throughout.  His overall theme addresses various aspects of modern-day life in London, though most of his thoughts, including those on irrational bigotry in the fiery “Hunting for Witches,” could apply on this side of the ocean.  “Uniform” has an inconsistent hold on melody, but Okereke quietly singing “There was a sense of disappointing as we left the mall / All the young people looked the same” more than makes up for that.  His concerns aren’t always rock staples—the outstanding duo of “Kreuzberg” and “I Still Remember” address, respectively, dissatisfaction with commitment-free relationships and what is likely a homosexual connection—and he hammers home the unconventional motifs with unconventionally intelligent lyrics, completing the puzzle.

Last year’s Intimacy neither re-writes Weekend nor bows to critics by returning to the sound of the debut.  Indeed, it feels independent, as though it could have come out at any time.  Several tracks are among their heaviest, while they also make room for brooding dirges.  From tracks three through nine, the powerful, odd-numbered rockers easily outpace the sparse, even-numbered ballads.   The album’s difficult to get into at first, but it hits spectacular peaks: sharp, sexy come-ons meld with the sharp, sexy riff in “Halo”; “One Month Off” sizzles with righteous vigor; “Talons” whips up a frenzied, apocalyptic sound perfectly at home with the lyrics fascinated with the menacing (“I didn’t think I’d catch fire when I held my hand to the flame”); and the majestic and ravishing “Ion Square” marries an insistent, orchestral beat to Okereke’s demand for commitment in a relationship. 

Sounding both beaten-down and optimistic, he concedes that “the hunger of those early years will never return,” but that doesn’t make him want to run out to the next parcel of grass.  When the excitement has dimmed, when you’re too old for clubs and unable to see someone for the first time again, Kele says, it’s still not worth giving up.  “Let’s stay in, let the sofa be our car / let’s stay in, let the TV be our stars” he cries during the almost painfully emotional climax.  The drop into the second chorus at the end is so mind-bogglingly good that it elevates the entire album, making the song their finest hour and a perfect conclusion to an entire effort devoted to relationships.  These boys have been more accessible, but rarely so intense.

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. Football season, TV season, and academic season all start at the same time, and it’s hit me pretty hard. Nonetheless, I wanted to try something new for the site: Discussing some TV. I know our tagline is movies and music but TV is really an offshoot of film, and, in many ways, I think the serialized, episodic medium begets more interesting discussion.

Here, I discuss the first season of Veronica Mars, which I just recently finished viewing on DVD. The first half of this post is spoiler-free. In the second half, I openly evaluate details of the conclusion of the season with spoilers. Since this is a mystery show, I suggest you avoid the second half if you’re considering ever watching this show.

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What makes a pilot episode of a TV series a good one?

To me, there’s just one obvious criterion: It has to make me want to keep watching the show. In that regards, Veronica Mars is easily the best pilot I’ve ever seen. It’s so full of intrigue, sparkles with such wit, and sets up such dramatic plot arcs that I didn’t hesitate for a second to press play on episode two.

What’s impressive about the pilot is that it piles on one layer of dread after another, and yet is ultimately memorable for the dignity it gives its characters. Even as the flashbacks about breakup, abandonment, rape, and murder pile on, the show refocuses on the powerful bond between Veronica and her father. The gripping final narration of the pilot puts emphasis on the characters not just as plot devices but as compelling people.

The pilot displays, in full force, the strengths of the show: great acting, a diverse cast, techno-noir visuals, Bogart-meets-Buffy heroine, and a razor-sharp wit. Even amidst the darkness of the plot, the pilot radiates with energy and polish. To see ideas so fully formed in the opening episode of a complex TV show is surely a mark that the series is headed in a good direction.

But therein lies the problem — also, the fun — of mystery stories: Almost always, the intrigue and the set-up is more interesting than the actual solution. And it’s true in the first season of Veronica Mars. There really was no way the show could match the fever pitch of intrigue in the pilot for an entire 22-episode season.

Miraculously, there are no bad episodes in the entire season, though some are admittedly better than others. The show’s decision to split each episode about 75%-25% between the mystery of the week and the serial mystery pays off well. We get a constant progression in the recurring plots that drew us to the show, but it’s not played out to a level that gets tiring.

The solutions of the big mysteries set up in the pilot generally do not disappoint, either. You can rest assured that there is a satisfying — though not perception-shattering — conclusion on its way.

It’s hard to go into too much description of plots or characters without giving any spoilers, but I will say that Logan develops from pretty generic into one of the most complicated characters on the show. His development is impressive, but he’s not the best character on the show.

Excepting the Kristen Bell-portrayed title character, the award for best character and acting goes to Keith Mars, Veronica’s dad, played by Enrico Colantoni, who steals every scene he’s in with a believable balance of protective father and detached professionalism. Also, virtually every scene with Francis Capra’s Weevil is a great one. Though he’s seen in every episode, I think he’s underutilized.

Duncan Kane, played by Teddy Dunn, is inconsistent and imperceptible, but I think that’s part of the point of the character. Still, I found it difficult to really empathize and connect with him except for in a few scenes and episodes.

Really, though, its Ms. Bell and her heroine that steal the show. The mysteries that Veronica solves are, for the most part, interesting not only because they’re well-constructed whodunits but because they’re as much about Veronica figuring herself out than they are figuring the culprit out.

We’re shown from the start that she’s a hard-nosed snark with a very quick tongue, but the character wouldn’t work if we didn’t see the undercurrent of a normal teenage girl in her. She flirts and wants to be adored. She takes on bigger problems than she can handle. She trusts her gut when she shouldn’t and needs others to bail her out. She’s manipulative and vengeful and overly dramatic — but sympathetic. You can’t blame her for acting like an adolescent act even if her problems are a bit bigger than a normal teen’s.

Bell captures all of this effortlessly. She’s cheerleader-beautiful, but bitter and strange enough that you can see why she’d be an outcast. When the moments call for it, she can drop her cold exterior and demonstrate her inner marshmallow quite convincingly.

Yet, the character can be a bit much. I really think she’s a bit too manipulative. She could’ve been ruthless and tortured, but less over-the-edge flawed. The amount of ‘favors’ she extracts from friends, and lies she tells her dad, makes it hard for me to always root for her.

Also, I know she’s a sleuth prodigy and all, but sometimes she pieces together and pulls off just a bit too much. If we could see her occasionally fail to figure it all out would pay great dividends on making her believable and pitiable, I think.

The show’s flaws fall outside of the Veronica character, as well. As much as I love the writing and the plots, sometimes I feel like they’re just a bit too twisty and and edgy for their own good. Sometimes, more than shock me, it just makes me role my eyes. Child-teacher relationships? Scientology-like cult? Some of it feels a bit tired at times.

Something that might date the series a little bit and turn off old-fashioned mystery fans is the shows heavy use of technology: texting, cell phones, the Internet, online databases, webcams, and more are all staples as clues. While this personally didn’t bother me, the portrayal of technology is distractingly inaccurate at times.

But, these flaws are absolutely overpowered by such a vibrant cast and plot and writing that I have to whole-heartedly endorse the first season of Veronica Mars. It brilliantly weaves plots together and manages to pull out surprising conclusions nearly every time, all the while sparkling with wit and energy. Give the incredible pilot a go and you won’t look back.

From here on out, I discuss the first season of Veronica Mars with full out spoilers for everything that happens in the first season’s episodes, up to and including the end of the season. Remember that this is a mystery show, so I suggest not continuing unless you’ve seen the first season.

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Rating: 4 stars (out of five)

Green Day offer up 21st Century Breakdown having done their fair share of conquering in both this and the previous century.  They dominated the alternative landscape of the post-Nirvana 90s (breakout album Dookie dropped just weeks before Kurt Cobain’s suicide) and then shocked the world with 2004’s concept album American Idiot, wherein Billie Joe Armstrong silenced those critics who assumed he couldn’t write about anything besides masturbation and boredom by tapping into Bush-era dissatisfaction.

Breakdown, arriving five years later, continues the concept album theme, even though there’s a new president and a little more optimism within the country.  But enough of that—what’s really worth paying attention to is the band.  The majority of these songs, especially the rockers, sound epic and alive, bursting with blood and vigor; Billie Joe sings with conviction, and the band sounds fuller than ever.  Though most of the slow songs sag (the flaccid “Last Night on Earth,” whiny “Restless Heart Syndrome,” and well-sung but cliché-ridden “21 Guns”), overall there’s a strong success rate among these 18 tracks.  Standout “The Static Age” has a perfect ear for tension/release.  “Before the Lobotomy” is filled with juicy melodies (and seems to give a shout-out to “Basket Case” with the line “I’m not stoned, I’m just fucked up.”)  Lead single “Know Your Enemy” is propelled by a heavy yet ferociously catchy, foot-stomping chorus and a titanic drum lead-in from the bridge.  The band hits remarkable peaks in the soaring bridges of “Little Girl,” “Static,” and “Guns” that elevate each track.

As is usual for Green Day albums, 21st Century Breakdown is long–too long–though the difference here is that the length allows for more diversity, making room for extended piano intros on songs like “Viva La Gloria,” a Middle Eastern-vibe on the groovy “Peacemaker,” and Queen-style drama on the title track, “Lobotomy,” and others.  “Last Night on Earth,” as Rolling Stone noted, sounds like Air Supply (not that this works), and of course several tunes invoke past, Dookie-esque grandeur.  Thankfully, the sonic doodling doesn’t sound forced; it just feels like the band, with little left to prove to the pop-punk audience, wants to experiment with new material to see what sticks.

What’s perhaps most notable about the musical variation is the way the individual songs themselves often contain distinct sections.  Sometimes this works—“Christian’s Inferno” opens with a thick, industrial-sounding drum intro before giving way to a purely Green Day chorus—but most of the best songs here (“Static,” “Little Girl,” “Murder City”) tell us that Green Day is better off keeping the sonic changes within songs to a minimum.  The title track starts off magnificently—you’d be hard-pressed to deny the power of Billie Joe’s line “My generation’s a zero / I never made it as a working class hero”—but after the second chorus devolves into an amelodic mess.  And, conversely, both “Gloria” and “Lobotomy” could stand to have their first segments cut; the latter is especially invigorating once it gets going, but that takes far too long.

Even though old target George Bush can no longer be used as a piñata, Armstrong hasn’t exactly embraced Obama-style optimism.  The conceptual theme this time traces two lovers, Christian and Gloria, as they make their way through this age with confusion, anger, fear, and some resolve.  Billie Joe skewers a few obvious targets (religious hypocrisy) and some less-obvious ones (prescription drug reliance) in his quest to find something truly meaningful.  There’s certainly no mistaking his feelings when he yelps, “Violence is the enemy / So give me, give me revolution!”  There are few great insights in the lyrics, but it’s nice to see that he’s continued to branch out a little, and despite an over-reliance on simplicity, he occasionally finds a nugget: “Do you know what’s worth fighting for / When it’s not worth dying for?”; “The traces of blood always follow you home / Like the mascara tears of your getaway.”

One wonders, however, whether his now ever-present world-weariness drags down his otherwise great sing-along choruses on tracks like “Century” and “Static.”  He’s flirting with Bono syndrome—sometimes, you just want him to forget about the world’s problems and sing about something enjoyable, relieving the ambivalent feelings that are engendered by energetic but polemic songs.

That feeling of slight hesitation getting in the way of a full-fledged adoration of the record has company.  Simmering gently below the visceral excitement that a listen provides is the desire to make tiny tweaks all over the place.  Man, if they just killed “Song of the Century” and “Last Night on Earth,” you think, how much better would this flow?  Why couldn’t “Breakdown” have kept going the way it started, “Lobotomy” have opened right at the 1:20 mark?  Why couldn’t Billie Joe have gone a little easy on the clichés in “Guns” and really made it a doozy?

If all that happened, then you’d have a stupendous album.  But that’s sort of always been Green Day’s M.O.  Their albums are typically overly long and sprawling, cathartic, flawed, and usually highly enjoyable.  21st Century Breakdown offers up more of the same.

How many diehard synthpop fans do you think live in Canada?  Maybe enough to crowd one toronto club, plus a few enlightened Inuits and a caribou.  Yet this half-frozen nation has given birth to perhaps the genre’s greatest Myspace-to-riches story in Valerie Poxleitner, known to her friends and fans as Lights.

At least, riches seem certain as she now releases her first LP, The Listening.  The number of plays she enjoys on a daily basis give public approbation to her Juno Award and the various other acclaims she has racked up prior to pressing a record.

Beating The Listening to stores by a full month is Ocean Eyes, the major-label debut of Owl City (nee Adam Young).  Born even further from the equator in the little town of Owatonna, MN, Young has experienced similar popularity and growth in response to self-sustained synthpop efforts.  The two are seen by many as each other’s other-gendered counterpart.

Rumors of varying integrity have labeled Lights and Owl City friends, collaborators, sweethearts, and doppelgangers.  What we know is that their homegrown brand of electronic melodies with softened, bubble-pop percussion and smooth, coasting vocals is catching on with the kids in every neighborhood.

As far as anyone seems to remember, the last softcore electronic artist to break into the mainstream so summa cum laude was The Postal Service.  While their only LP, Give Up, was reported by Sub Pop to be their most successful release since Bleach (it has since been surpassed by Flight of the Conchords), a single supporting tour is all the wake it generated.  Some chatter has ensued, but passing years show further Postal Service tours and recordings to be dreams without wings.

There’s your overview.  Here’s my problem.

Our generation has never had a mainstream affinity for the buzzes and whirs and padsynth drums of adventurous electronic artists.  Naturally, the three crooners – or perhaps cooers – to break through are extensively sized up against each other.  But as adorable as Lights and Owl City are, they are not The Postal Service.

The Postal Service is commonly referred to as a side project of Ben Gibbard, the face of indie wunderband Death Cab for Cutie.  Despite the public’s impression, Gibbard is not Death Cab’s heart, soul, and guiding light.  In particular, guitarist-cum-producer Chris Walla plays a large part in their writing process.  And despite the fact that you hear Gibbard’s crystal pipes on every track of Give Up, it was not a solo effort.  As educated as he is in sonic development, Gibbard does not have the right skill set to take a chisel to a synthesizer and carve out such an wondrously glitchy album.

The first Postal Service song was released on two years before Give Up hit the shelves on an album called Life Is Full of Possibilities.  If you’re confused, check Wikipedia, I’ll wait.  Make sure you catch the artist name painted across the ambulance on the cover.  That’s the guy who wrote all the other songs on Life Is Full of Possibilities, so we’ve got good reason to interpolate that Dntel is also responsible for – did you catch it, next to Ben Gibbard’s name? – (This Is) The Dream of Evan and Chan.

Dntel is mastermind Jimmy Tamborello, a synthhead who sprang out of California in the early 1990′s.  Under that primary penname and a few others, Tamborello has accrued critical acclaim and a handful of adherents by spinning out imaginative records loaded with electronica candy.  His style is of his own design.

Through a serendipity of geographical coincidence, Gibbard got an invite from Tamborello to lay down vocals over a tune he had crafted.  While Dntel had collaborated with many others before, Gibbard’s cachet with hipsters and the approachable style that later took Death Cab to more widespread fame gave The Dream of Evan and Chan unprecedented motility.  The pair hardly hesitated before plunging into a more extensive tag-team project.

First, Tamborello built a full album of instrumental material from the ground up.  He put the tracks on tapes and shipped them to the great state of Washington, where Gibbard tagged in.  The bespectacled twenty-something was given free rein to reorganize the beats as necessary while he plotted lyrical melodies overtop.  From there, extra hands came into play: significantly, Chris Walla appeared on one of the finalized songs playing piano and handled the whole recording process at his Hall of Justice studio.  Female vocals were courtesy of Rilo Kiley frontwoman Jenny Lewis and little-known indie songstress Jen Wood.

You might glean from the above that Ben Gibbard acted in a greater capacity than any other single contributer to shape Give Up.  I won’t press the issue because it doesn’t matter whether you’re right or wrong.  Tamborello’s brilliant work is central to the spirit and polish of the album and his part in the partnership is chronically downplayed.

Returning to Lights and Owl City, take a test drive on each of their lead singles – Saviour and Fireflies, respectively.  Then play Such Great Heights, the first Postal Service single.  If you focus on the voices, you’ll notice that Adam Young and Ben Gibbard sound remarkably alike, while Valerie Poxleitner manipulates her vox with a touch of artifice.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

If you focus on the electronics underneath, you might come to see why I feel Tamborello dominates the newcomers.  His choice of sounds shows a greater willingness to take chances and a greater depth of experience from chances taken over an inventive career.  Subtly, he employs irregular three-measure phrases throughout Such Great Heights, even overlaying them with standard four-measure phrases in other instruments to create a drawn out polyrhythmic effect.

Dntel provided the fundaments of The Postal Service, and his influence on Give Up is still the element that sets that landmark album apart from young imitators.  Over time, I’m sure Lights and Owl City will grow their talents.  They may exchange their in-your-face rocktronica choruses for more adventuresome techniques, or they may diverge from Dntel-style beats rather than aspiring to them.  But at the moment, there is no comparison.

In closing: The Postal Service was Dntel’s side project.  His idea, his beats, his project.