Sonic Sandwich: The House that Japandroids Built

I try not to re-read my reviews. Once I post them, I give them another once-over to make sure all the points I wanted to get in are in there, and sufficiently supported. Sometimes, when listening to-and-then-writing about music, I get very in my own head and it's hard to translate what I'm feeling. The blog has always been more or less an attempt to negotiate with that. I'm usually satisfied when I hit "publish," and then a few months down the line, if I happen to check back in, I'll inevitably wince. It's kind of the reason reviews have slowed to a trickle lately, I want all the time I can get to make sure I'm saying it right.

As time moves on after a review, I'll usually keep listening to the album, and I'll think "I wish that occurred to me at the time." Not only do I think of better ways to say what I said, I think of better ways to think of the album. Opinions change over time. I never post anything I think I might contradict down the line, and that holds true for every review I've written. But I inevitably hear new and better things in them.

This is what's been going through my head tonight as I've had a brief exchange with my friend and colleague James Leask about Japandroids' excellent 2012 album Celebration Rock. Apropos nothing, he tweeted me:

@scottowilliams That “And they will!” In response to “When they love you and they will” in “The House That Heaven Built” is boss as SHIT

— James Leask (@Leask) April 12, 2013

Looking back over my write-up, my praise of that album was pretty general. Enthusiastic, sure, but still general. I found it a viscerally thrilling album, praised that they were able to keep that energy up for the full 35 minutes, and didn't really ask anything more of it. And that's still somewhat true, I believe that's the best level to enjoy music on, but I don't want to short change this album any credit. Though it's blunt in its approach, it's still subtle in its construction: the exact placement of the ohs and yeahs, the very economical lyrics, which are basic but loaded and perfectly chosen. You don't have to have sophisticated tastes to appreciate it, but it's not simple music. I was listening to "Continuous Thunder" today and it really hit me hard, "If I had all the answers / and you had the body you wanted..."

This isn't about recanting my position on Celebration Rock. I loved it then and I love it now, and maybe I understand that love differently with six months between the two. My reviews are for a time and place, and I believe you can hear something 100 times and then suddenly on the 101st it hits you differently, for better or worse. If professional critics publish their reviews with more certainty in their words than I do, then I'm impressed, because in the back of my head I always know that in a few weeks I may see each piece of music a bit differently. I'm still learning, I'll probably never finish.

But this doesn't cast doubt on any of my reviews or recommendations. One thing I will always trust is my instincts, and I have never given my approval to an album that I wish I didn't. And every post on this site, every proper review is that stamp. But I can't just say "Scotto recommends this, so enjoy!" I need to say why. I need to navigate that dialogue, and that's something I've known is an issue since day one and will continue to try to get better at.

Japandroids: Celebration Rock

Celebration Rock is a simple pleasure, but a real and valuable one. It sounds like a car roaring down a lonely highway, barreling through at twenty over the speed limit, windows open arms flailing out in the wind. This is not so much an album made up of individual songs that are great, but a great cachet of a sound, of thundering drums and roaring guitars that scorch and seem to multiply the longer they are left playing. It sounds like a triumph over humility: brash and bold and of course, celebratory. This is victory.

"Authentic" is a dumb word but they come by their thrills honestly, with anthemic chords and shout-along choruses, like "The Nights of Wine and Roses" and "Fire's Highway" and "Adrenaline Nightshift" and "Younger Us" and "The House That Heaven Built," never marred by overthought. They're all visceral and physical and instinctual. So many "Ohs" and "Yeahs." Albums rarely get made like this, because of the natural desire to flex creative muscles and go in a different direction with each song, but haven't you ever listened to a song and thought "That was awesome, put it on repeat!" Of course you have. And Celebration Rock does that for you by making the tracks themselves the repeat - with slight subtle new wrinkles each time to keep you interested. It puts you in that young, exuberant, energetic state of mind and keeps you there. The call-and-answer lyrics reaffirm every positive, defiant thing, and the mix lets those vocals sound like the sound of a distant crowd clamoring to be heard above the more immediate instruments, all-powerful guitars and propulsive, firework-like drums. The lyrics themselves underscore the mood of overcoming yourself and throwing yourself into the thick of it.

There are two tracks on the album that are distinct in any way, and they still fit the overall aesthetic of the album pretty damn well. One is the menacing southwestern-tinged "For The Love Of Ivy," which snarls a bit too much to be one of the album's highlights, and the other is the slow-burning "Continuous Thunder," which gradually slips us out of the fiery dream this album has created. It's the cherry on top.

I dig the single-mindedness with which this album approaches its music, and by committing to it wholeheartedly it becomes compulsively listenable, loopable, livable. Not (merely) an album loaded with great songs but an album built out of a great sound, like the bizarro world counterpart to the xx, where loudness and raucousness were a virtue, rather than spareness and restraint... but the result is oddly similar, a genuine, no distractions, piece of concrete.

This has been a loud year for me. Of the albums I heard in 2012 - not just the ones that came out this year - I've mixed in Sleigh Bells, Death From Above 1979, Pretty Girls Make Graves and Sonic Youth (as well as Dinosaur Bones and Naked & Famous, which weren't exactly lullabys.) Japandroids are by no means the loudest, but they are so dedicated to their sound that it's impossible to deny the power they wield. They strip away all extra bits that conventional wisdom would insist are important to any kind of music, scrubbing away any bit of self-consciousness about repetition or any pretense of self-effacement... this is trance-inducingly good, body-rockingly good, soul-movingly good. This is what we need. When they cry out for "Younger Us," that's exactly what they bring you with this music.

Buy this album now: iTunes Canada // iTunes USA // Amazon.ca // Amazon.com