(2021) Death Cab for Cutie - The Photo Album [Deluxe Edition]


Review:
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of ‘The Photo Album’, Death Cab for Cutie are releasing a deluxe version of the record, complete with 3 bonus tracks, rarities and previously unheard covers. The 35-track reissue feature a remastered version of the original album, and include 2002’s ‘The Stability’ EP as the three bonus tracks. The new covers include Björk’s “All Is Full of Love” and The Stone Roses’ “I Wanna Be Adored.” U.K. b-sides and other rarities, such as the band’s original demos for the album, will also be on the expanded edition.
Released in 2000, We Have the Facts and We’re Voting Yes delivered on the promise of You Can Play These Songs with Chords and Something About Airplanes. For once, a band’s popularity grew commensurate with its maturation.Despite the heightened attention, singer/songwriter/guitarist Ben Gibbard next let loose Death Cab for Cutie’s finest moment, “Photobooth,” the lead track on the sparkling Forbidden Love EP. New fans worldwide swooned under its beguiling romantic rise ‘n’ fall and its lingering, bittersweet, wallet-sized artifact. And though it wouldn’t have killed them to include “Photobooth” here — for its spotless greatness and thematic likeness — The Photo Album‘s ten tracks are of the EP’s heightened caliber. Gibbard’s words screen intriguing mini-films of the mind, stoked by corresponding daydreamy music. An exquisite liaison of the British penchant for ringing, knelling, subconscious guitars and direct/grittier American drive, the band is tight, evocative, and inventive. Bassist Nick Harmer and drummer Michael Schorr lock in creative rhythmic bases, while Gibbard and Chris Walla’s guitar work gives the band climactic, cinematic coloring shades. And, in the end, it’s Gibbard’s remarkable abilities as a writer and singer that are on display most. Each word draws you in via his sweet, thoughtful guy voice. The solo 1:47 opener, “Steadier Footing,” is merely a starter course, but it feels like an entrée: “And this is the chance I never got/To make a move, but we just talk” is only one measure of the chances/plans/dreams/connections and relationships that have eluded him or fizzled. Reeled in, one is left to look back over one’s own smoldering wreckage, of opportunities or attachments lost — much as “A Movie Script Ending”‘s abrupt turn “Passing through unconscious states/When I awoke I was on the highway” somehow segues into the couplet “With your hands on my shoulders/A meaningless movement, a movie script ending.” Like “Photobooth,” it’s a typically sobering, adverse assessment of how unromantic the romanticized can become. That it’s a great pop song, arresting in its jerky wobble, is just another point in its, and this LP’s, favor. The world needs more superb pop with brains and heart and emotional complexity. — AMG





Track Listing:
Disc 1:
01. Steadier Footing
02. A Movie Script Ending
03. We Laugh Indoors
04. Information Travels Faster
05. Why You’d Want To Live Here
06. Blacking Out The Friction
07. I Was A Kaleidoscope
08. Styrofoam Plates
09. Coney Island
10. Debate Exposes Doubt

Disc 2:
01. 20th Century Towers
02. All Is Full Of Love
03.  Stability

Disc 3:
01. Gridlock Caravans
02. Information Travels Faster (Alternate Lyric Demo)
03. I Wanna Be Adored (Live)
04. I Was A Kaleidoscope (Live)
05. We Laugh Indoors (Dub)
06. Debate Exposes Doubt (Acoustic)
07. A Movie Script Ending (Acoustic)
08. I Was A Kaleidoscope (Acoustic, Live on KEXP)
09. Corny Island (Studio Outtake)
10. We Laugh Indoors (UK Single Mix)

Disc 4:
24. Steadier Footing
25. A Movie Script
26. We Laugh Indoors
27. Information Travels Faster
28. Why You’d Want To Live Here
29. Blacking Out The Friction
30. I Was A Kaleidoscope
31. Styrofoam Plates
32. Coney Island
33. Debate Exposes Doubt
34. 20th Century Towers
35. Stable Song


Media Report:
Genre: indie-pop, indie-rock
Country: USA
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec, 16-bit PCM
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits