Anyone who reads my blog regularly knows about my unhealthy obsession with all things Spencer Krug. Sunset Rubdown is pretty much officially my favorite band ever at this point, after only three albums, and that's just one of his three bands -- he's also one half of the more famous Wolf Parade and one third of the indie rock supergroup Swan Lake. And oh yeah, he's also releasing "solo" singles as "Moonface". I think he's put out 7 full lengths in just the past 5 years, and they've all been different degrees of amazing. But... there's someone else out there who's been just about as prolific, and almost as amazing, but he's fallen into the shadow, at least on this blog, of the great Spencer Krug. I'm talking of course of his fellow Canadian cohort and member of Swan Lake, Dan Bejar. Bejar's own band Destroyer has put out 5 full-lengths and 2 EPs since 2001, which isn't quite Krug-ian but is impressive in its own right, especially when among those were the brilliant Destroyer's Rubies and Your Blues and This Night. He's also a member of the more famous Canadian collective The New Pornographers, and although I'm not as big a fan of the band as the rest of the indie rock world maybe is, I do universally love all of Bejar's contributions, which actually sound a lot like Destroyer (Bejar's got a somewhat distinctive voice, to put it mildly). And then of course there's Swan Lake, and his songs for that band are pretty awesome as well. Plus, he has a 4th project, Hello Blue Roses, which was a collaboration with his girlfriend, and they put out an album in 2008. Like he didn't have enough on his plate.
As I was compiling my list of Top 100 songs for 2009, a year in which Bejar was somewhat quiet, I still found myself putting him all over the countdown. "Bay of Pigs," his 13-minute disco rave about the Cuban missile crisis as Destroyer is on there. And then there's "Heartswarm," his contribution to the Swan Lake's wonderful Enemy Mine. And there's the New Pornographers with their cover of Destroyer's (somewhat superior) "Hey, Snow White". Yeah, it's on there too. So in a year in which his main band, Destroyer, didn't release an album he still found himself writing three of my top 50 songs. And I'm pretty sure if you go back through history, he'd have done the same just about every year in the second half of this decade, much like Krug, except he's sort of flown under my radar, and I apologize for that. Mr. Bejar is a god too. Enjoy some of his brilliance below.
- I don't have a freakin' clue what this song is about (much like most of Bejar's writing -- along with Krug's come to think of it), but the 2-minute repeated closing explosion "And someone's got to fall before someone goes free" is one of the most magical moments in the history of indie rock, if not in all of music.
Download The New Pornographers - "Ballad of a Comeback Kid".mp3
Download The New Pornographers - "Testament To Youth In Verse".mp3
Download Swan Lake - "Ballad Of A Swan Lake, Or, Daniel's Song".mp3
Yes, Bejar is a god. I always anticipate heavily any new material from him and
I am never disappointed!
Posted by: Wayne | December 07, 2009 at 05:28 PM