When discussing a new Sunset Rubdown album it's become pretty cliché to list everything Spencer Krug's recently accomplished, but his output remains as prolific as each release is monumental, so it does remains an important piece of the story. Since the massive Random Spirit Lover showed up a couple years ago, Swan Lake released Enemy Mine and Wolf Parade brought you At Mount Zoomer. Now, a little less than a year since Zoomer surfaced and a few months post-Enemy, Sunset Rubdown's delivering their third full-band full-length Dragonslayer. When Krug came through for a Progress Report he told us about a forthcoming marimba EP (what?) as well as misgivings he had aboutRandom Spirit Lover, explaining Dragonslayer would use less studio trickery because "I like [live] kinds of recordings because they're very honest and it's hard to pretend that you sound any different from whatever it is." He wasn't lying.
A large part of Krug's charm is his labyrinthine song structures. You still get that on here, but the tracks do come off as more immediate. Last time we had a dozen songs in about an hour; this time it's 8 songs in 48 minutes, largely because the last track, "Dragon's Lair" breaks the 10-minute mark. So, yes, the mazes exist, but they're stripped somewhat bare -- it does sound more alive, as anyone who's seen the band live can attest. For instance, the noisy "Black Swan" might be the rawest post-Snake's Got A Leg music we've had from the guy. And the haunting organ sound on "Nightingale / December Song"? It feels more direct than Random, which was a very fine album, as is this, but this is also Krug trusting the songs themselves and not piling on the production. Somehow it lends the songs a richer emotional resonance. And part of that's because Sunset Rubdown is a band, not just Krug. On Dragonslayer, he's rejoined by Jordan Robson-Cramer (drums, guitar, and keys), Michael Doerksen (guitar and bass), and Camilla Wynne Ingr (keys, percussion, and vocals), and their increased familiarity with each other shows. There's also a new guy, bassist and occasional drummer Mark Nicol, but you might not immediately know it (in a good way).
Of course, it also helps that the main man still has a way with words. In the lovely opener "Silver Moon," a love song about ballet, hidden wine, fallen trees, and various rituals, among other things, he gives us: "I believe in growing old with grace / I believe she only loved my face / And I think maybe these days are over over now / Gone are the days bonfires make me think of you / Looks like the prophecy came true." Or on the excellently epic "You Go On Ahead (Trumpet Trumpet II)" -- right, an echo of "Trumpet, Trumpet, Toot! Toot!" -- he lets us know: "When me and the boys were out / We killed a thousand butterflies / So I put their wings into my mouth and said a prayer for our safe arrival / And then a big black car crossed our path / And I wondered whether or not that shit was empty." No, it's not empty at all. Really, we might as well quote the fairytale-dropping short story of a closer "Dragon's Lair" in its entirety. What a fucking jam.
The thing with Krug is that even with big songs and concepts, he manages to keep it catchy. You've heard the anthemic rocker "Idiot Heart." Go back right now to just after the 3-minute minute mark when Camilla joins him on vocals and song bursts open. See, it doesn't matter he's singing about his beloved Icarus (though that is some nice icing). Speaking of mythology, though, doesn't "Apollo And The Buffalo And Anna Anna Anna Oh!" sound like the name of a Frog Eyes song? And, considering Dragonslayer includes a "cover" of Swan Lake's "Paper Lace," maybe he's running out of ideas? Nah, he's always liked these sorts of conversations between records -- see, for instance, "Snakes Got A Leg III," "Stadiums And Shrines II," etc. Plus, Sunset Rubdown's circus-time/steel-drum version of the more downtrodden Swan Lake go's an undeniable kick.
You really do get the sense that the aforementioned projects are adding up to something, that they remain inextricably linked no matter the lineup. It's easy to think of it as one giant stain-glass cathedral of sound. What's more difficult to comprehend is why Sunset Rubdown hasn't enjoyed the same sort of crossover success as some other albeit quite different ambitious indie rock acts (see Grizzly Bear, Animal Collective, Arcade Fire). Whatever the case, it's always a pleasure watching him painstakingly construct his singular, strange, endlessly expanding oeuvre.
"This is for the critics and their disappointed mothers." It's also for your Memorial Day BBQ:
Sunset Rubdown - "Idiot Heart" (MP3)
Dragonslayer is out 6/23 via Jagjaguwar.
