It's title is loaded - simultaneously ambiguous, intimate, troubled,
and peaceful. It evokes the power with which romance is able to eclipse
everything that conspires to destroy it, and also the residue of
sadness that remains in the calm aftermath of conflict.
In
Our Bedroom After the War, the name of Stars' fourth, newest - and,
without question, best - full-length album, is mysterious, grand, and
multifaceted. Which is fitting, because the 13 marvelous songs
collected under that name are as well. Each and every one of them.
"What
is
the darkest possible situation that I could try to turn into a
beautiful pop song?" Stars frontman Torquil Campbell asks. "That was
sort of my mission with this record. If you could make horror movies
that were like love stories, that would be my ultimate genre."
Which
isn't
to say that Bedroom is dark or difficult music. On the contrary,
it may be the most nakedly euphoric-sounding collection the band has
made yet. And it was made, last spring at Vancouver's Warehouse
recording studio, amidst an atmosphere of unprecedented synergy and
self-belief.
Set Yourself on Fire, Stars' previous studio album,
provided the Montreal-spawned quintet with their international
breakthrough, five years after the band was first hatched by the duo of
Campbell and keyboardist Chris Seligman while they were living
near-penniless in New York City. Now gold certified in Canada, Fire
proved so end …
It's title is loaded - simultaneously ambiguous, intimate, troubled,
and peaceful. It evokes the power with which romance is able to eclipse
everything that conspires to destroy it, and also the residue of
sadness that remains in the calm aftermath of conflict.
In
Our Bedroom After the War, the name of Stars' fourth, newest - and,
without question, best - full-length album, is mysterious, grand, and
multifaceted. Which is fitting, because the 13 marvelous songs
collected under that name are as well. Each and every one of them.
"What
is
the darkest possible situation that I could try to turn into a
beautiful pop song?" Stars frontman Torquil Campbell asks. "That was
sort of my mission with this record. If you could make horror movies
that were like love stories, that would be my ultimate genre."
Which
isn't
to say that Bedroom is dark or difficult music. On the contrary,
it may be the most nakedly euphoric-sounding collection the band has
made yet. And it was made, last spring at Vancouver's Warehouse
recording studio, amidst an atmosphere of unprecedented synergy and
self-belief.
Set Yourself on Fire, Stars' previous studio album,
provided the Montreal-spawned quintet with their international
breakthrough, five years after the band was first hatched by the duo of
Campbell and keyboardist Chris Seligman while they were living
near-penniless in New York City. Now gold certified in Canada, Fire
proved so enduringly popular in so many parts of the world that the
band left on tour following its 2004 release and barely stopped for the
next two years. Suddenly, this most sophisticated of pop groups was
required to adapt to the life of something its members never expected
to become: road warriors.
Yet while that life brought about
moments of great personal turbulence amongst the band (one of which
inspired at least one new song title, the irreverent "Bitches in
Tokyo"), it also made Stars - which had traditionally spent long
stretches apart between albums - a lithe, artful fighting unit. You can
now hear that extraordinary evolution all over Bedroom; the result,
says bassist and guitarist Evan Cranley, who co-writes most of Stars'
music with Seligman, "of a lot of natural, off-the-cuff playing - not
erasing every single mistake, trying to keep the most beautiful
mistakes possible."
"There's very few things that phase us now,"
says Campbell, "so the relaxation and the toughness and the confidence
of the playing [on Bedroom] is because everyone is very comfortable
with what they do."
"We've been together for seven years and
experienced a plethora of things, and still genuinely love one
another," says singer and guitarist Amy Millan, who became an acclaimed
solo artist with the release of her debut solo album, 2006's Honey from
the Tombs. "With this record, it just shows the confidence of our
friendship and our ability to get through a lot of things. And we push
each other, too - that's another reason why we trust each other."
"There's
a
very high level of expectation in this band for each other's work,"
adds Campbell. "There's a sense that you have to come to the table with
things that are very interesting and good or someone will tell you that
they're not, and we were especially good this time about doing that in
a way that was respectful and constructive. It helped to make the whole
album work better."
Drummer Pat McGee offers the most emphatic
description of the making of Bedroom: "From the beginning, everything
has gone exactly according to plan. We had a vision, and we conquered
every step of that vision."
That vision is consistent with
Stars' characteristic knack for melodic, literate pop songs. But never
before have their songs sounded so widescreen, nor have Campbell's and
Millan's eye for detail - the crucial minutiae that makes a good lyric
great - been so acutely focused. Indeed, the band's compositional
skills have become so finely honed as to be almost telepathic. Seligman
recalls being in Montreal, playing the chords for what would become
Bedroom's epic title track down the telephone to Campbell, who was in
Vancouver. 'He heard the chords and said, "That's exactly it!'"
Seligman says. "He had already written the words. We were in two
different cities, but it was almost like the music and the words were
meant to be together. Torquil had an intense reaction to that - it was
such a coincidence."
From beginning to end, In Our Bedroom After
the War sounds like the product of similar magic. Whether the clarion
call of "The Night Starts Here" (perhaps the closest Stars have come to
full-on rock), the percolating Steely-Dan-at-the-disco groove of "The
Ghost of Genova Heights," or the heartbreaking melancholy of the above
mentioned title track, it's the work of a band that has become
absolutely sure of its strengths, but that hasn't forgotten the beauty
of simplicity. And while some of it is reflective of the tumultuous
times in which it was written, Bedroom ultimately leaves the listener
with the feeling of joy and contentment that comes from having heard a
truly great album - an art form that, in this rapid-fire cultural
climate, still has incomparable value.
"To me, that's our
responsibility in writing pop songs," says Campbell, "is that no matter
how grim it is, it's your life, and we have to try to make it beautiful
for three-and-a-half minutes."
