Aphera Music

This article, brought to you by aphera, comes from our wonderful friend and guest writer, Jillian Favorite.

Forgiveness Rock Record

Personally, there is nothing more quintessential to my coming of age story than Broken Social Scene. Very many firsts throughout my youth were accompanied by the experimental ambient rock of Kevin Drew and the Canadian collective – first sip of jug wine, first joy-ride with my sluts and unfortunately my first cigarette in addition to many others. Thus when I heard that BSS was coming out with a new album this spring, I immediately thought of their self titled album (Broken Social Scene/Windsurfing Nation) and You Forgot It in People, two of my all time favorite albums.

But to be quite honest, my joy was quickly followed by doubt.  What else can they really do? They pretty much have labeled themselves as instrumentalists – and nothing else. Can you add more instruments to instruments? Well like always, I was wrong; vocals can be added as instruments as well.

listen here:

The vocals stand out immensely in Forgiveness Rock Record. In the opening track, “World Sick”, Kevin Drew hints at where the band came from with its previous albums with an opening guitar solo followed by his message “my love is for the man”—it almost has a “Cause = Time” (You Forgot It in People) and “7/4 (Shoreline)” (BSS) feel. Tracks like “All to All” and “Sentimental X’s” present female vocalists Emily Haines, Leslie Feist and Amy Millan, whose cooing puts listeners in a world of whimsy. And lastly, the track titled “Sweetest Kill” makes me melt as Drew’s voice drips with seductiveness all the while juxtaposed with a swaying tempo.

In addition to mature vocals, the Canadians have done it with a collection of well produced tracks. This can be attributed to dropping David Newfield as a producer and moving onto John McEntire. But let’s be honest, producers can’t do everything. The group has incredible instrumentals, but the layering has cleaned up beautifully. Instead of noisy chaos, the band has made every instrument count. No longer is the reaction to the music, “this piece could use more of this, or less of that,” but for once “everything fits right into place.”

It is as though when I was listening to Broken Social Scene growing up, they were growing up as a group also. Forgiveness Rock Record shows a lot of maturity that the group hasn’t shown before—the producing, the layering and especially the vocals, and I’m happy to say that they’re still going to be a part of my journey that is life. Give it a listen. As I’m starting anew in my life and becoming a big kid (maybe?) these guys will surely accompany me.

• Bookmark on Delicious
• Digg this post
• Recommend on Facebook
• share via Reddit
• Share with Stumblers
• Tweet about it
• Subscribe to the comments on this post