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 Caught in the Carousel - "There will be music despite everything"
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Bye Bye Blackbirds
Fixed Hearts
Rainbow Quartz
"Great music," the English conductor Thomas Beecham once wrote, "is that which penetrates the ear with facility and leaves the memory with difficulty. Magical music never leaves the memory." Although the magic Beecham refers to is almost impossible to describe or apprehend, it's certainly very easy to spot. And here's why: either it's there, or it's not.
In the case of Bradley Skaught and his band The Bye Bye Blackbirds, that magic is front and center and on full display on his band's new album Fixed Hearts. The 'Birds' third album overall is a catchy platter of literate pop that's loaded generously with gorgeous harmonies and an effortless melodicism.
The punchy opener "Elizabeth Park" suggests the early work of Game Theory; the jangling "Jack Frost" wouldn't have sounded out of place on any record by The Byrds and "Every Night At Noon" is pitch-perfect indie rock stomp.
While 2008's Houses and Homes was a breezy collection of back porch jangle, Fixed Hearts is a more diverse collection, filled with a range of sonic textures and styles. "Through The Clouds" is the pop song Tom Petty has been searching for for the past decade; "Mermaids" has a Motown-kissed backbeat and the album closing "Silver Sands," which features Skaught's stirring falsetto, is nothing short of blissful.
Quite easily one of the best albums of 2011.
—Alex Green
Bradley Skaught talks to Caught In The Carousel:
Caught In The Carousel: How does Fixed Hearts compare sonically to your last effort?
Bradley Skaught: It's quite a different sounding record for a number of reasons.
Part of the difference involves a lineup shuffle in which Aaron Rubin replaced our old bass player William Duke—he's a very different kind of bass player and he brought a whole new sonic personality to the band. We were also playing with Mike Derrick for a while who's a brilliant acoustic guitar player—his rhythm parts on the record are really distinct. We also handed production duties over to Paul Tyler. Originally it was a bit of an experiment to try out his home recording gear, but we had so much fun we just kept going. It was all done on computer (a first for us) and Paul really put a lot of emphasis on the live arrangements—there's a lot less ornamentation and I think it's much closer to the live sound than past efforts. He's also got an excellent ear for guitar sounds, and he was really hands-on in dialing that stuff in. I think we're actually a better sounding band for having worked with him -- it was a great education and challenge.
CITC: How would you describe the result?
BS: We ended up with a much brighter, more modern sounding record—less cluttered, hopefully less old fashioned in a way. As much as we draw on the classic, fundamental elements of guitar pop, we're not really all that interested in recreating a specific time and place with our recordings. It should sound like 2011.
CITC: Were these songs percolating for a while?
BS: Once I've got a new song in decent shape, I'm usually pretty anxious to get them into the live rotation. A few of these songs were in the set as far back as 2009. There was an album taking shape with our then-bass player, who also wrote and sang, and when he left the band I had to write a whole bunch of stuff to shore up the set and build the new record around.
CITC: Can you talk a bit about the songwriting process—easier or harder these days?
BS: It's never easy, but Fixed Hearts was the certainly least painful, most enjoyable batch to write. Especially lyrically—I really hit a stride early on and felt like I was able to let them flow in a way I might not have been comfortable with in the past. I was also unemployed during that time, so I may be confusing ease of writing with just having lots of time to fuss with things and let them work themselves out. Since rejoining the working classes I've hardly written a note—we'll see how this goes.
CITC: Thematically, do you find yourself drawn to the same subjects?
BS: I tend to go in phases as far as themes are concerned. For the Fixed Hearts songs I was thinking a lot about the ways that people in relationships (romantic, friendships, work, etc.) have their own little private worlds—the accumulation of experiences and phrases and rhythms that are totally separate from their public lives. "Kiss The World" is a fun song about sex and cute girls, but the details in it are the kinds of little casual things that happen between lovers that are just the two partners together creating their relationship out of the little bits and pieces of their private time together. It doesn't always have to be romantic, of course—we all have a million of these little worlds that we maintain in our daily lives. Part of the fun of social media, I think, is watching all those little private worlds collide (I think I just mashed up a bunch of Neil Finn songs there!)
CITC: What perspective do you like to write from?
BS: In general I like to write from a kind of memory or dream perspective as opposed to storytelling. I'm always really floored by a songwriter who can create fleshed out characters or communicate an immediate emotional experience with a lot of clarity, but I find I'm most comfortable in a more impressionistic mode—I tend to hang a lot of my memories on the general feel of times and places as opposed to the details. Some of my earliest lyricist heroes were people like Michael Stipe or Robyn Hitchcock—guys who can do a more painterly thing with language. Many are the days I wish I could be Hal David, though. A guy like Scott Miller is probably my ultimate lyricist—he uses a really dense, idiosyncratic style to spin some dazzling pictures but he's razor-sharp insightful and emotionally in tune at the same time. He really comes closest to accomplishing in a pop song what I find most satisfying about great Modern poetry.
Fixed Hearts is out now. You should get it...
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