The indie-friendly blogs haven’t been alight like this since Merriweather Post Pavilion at the beginning of the year. Leaks and band fandom helped make up that one’s hype, and the same is applicable here. Several of these songs date back to last year and have been available in some fashion for many months and there's no denying the enthusiasm of Grizzly faithful. Yet the buzz behind each record left me more curious than anticipatory. I didn’t really “get” Animal Collective until Pavilion (and the light that clicked on in my attic flooded the whole house) and while I enjoyed Yellow House and the Friend EP, Grizzly Bear always left me wanting a little more (and fan loyalty was tough even for a typically loyal fanatic like myself to understand). Then I heard “Two Weeks” and it changed.
I knew that “Two Weeks” was going to be Veckatimest’s best song, but I didn’t know it was going to be the most different as well. I thought I saw a different direction to the artful folk rockers, but “Two Weeks” is an anomaly, a striking centerpiece that can’t really be defined as such because what follows it isn’t much more than a more ambitious, studied and form-fitted sampling of their past work.
Sure, it’s different enough to stand apart as the rest of their catalog has, but it’s no leaps-and-bounds strive. Not a bad thing, no, and it was my fault to hope so based on one song (especially since the other three songs I knew beforehand didn’t share that anticipation), but that’s not even the problem. Actually, according to early word, there are no notable problems on here.
The album starts out on such a magnificent tear that I was a believer almost immediately. “Southern Point” refers to the album title, an island at the south end of Cape Cod that became a Grizzly Bear hangout. Melodically flattering and fluttering, effervescently up tempo, sonically rich without becoming dense—images of Armchair Apocrypha's best weren’t far off. When the rhythm crumbles into electronic percolations and then returns to the wood cabin crash, it’s impossible not to get swept away. Then, after the brilliant pop of “Two Weeks,” “All We Ask” opens slower, with a faint chord progression giving way to a quiet guitar and then some rum-tum drum work. Breeziness segues into a shuddering march and when it breaks down (“I can’t get out of what I’m into with you”) you almost shiver. “Fine for Now” starts off sounding like a CSN harmony until a noisy wave crash sends the billowing melody into a toybox mess; the ruffles help a lot, believe me, especially as the mood tends to be inordinately intimate and abstemious.
But not everything is right in this wonderland, and that presence is felt heavy at times. Sequencing could be a factor, or it could be a devotion to singularity, but this record starts to drag in the fifth slot, “Cheerleader.” It’s a song that most know by now, and while underwhelmed, I always gently enjoyed it as just a little mp3 trapped in the shuffle. But when it arrives on the disc, the mid tempo drift starts to become tedious and it’s not melodically strong enough to consider the effort anything other than, um, an effort. Following that up with the sweetly romantic but dreadfully slow burden of “Dory” only exacerbates matters. Interest begins to wane. Being saved by the patchwork arrangement of “Ready, Able” edifies the belief that something pretty good can sound great so long as it’s different.
The climax of the lethargic psych-folk gurgler “I Live with You” isn’t earned, but it does help. It’s another instance of a promising intro dissolving into the usual tricks, punctuated late in the game by codas of remarkable curiosity and wide-ranging quality. Late in the album, you want more energy, so you notice the final minute over the rest; played on its own, the emphasis on the midsection’s muffled psychedelia is impressive, relaxing yet unnerving in the same space. The aforementioned “Dory” ain’t actually too shabby either, even though its promising intro dissolves into Grizz standard fare awfully easily. Really, the only one that’s not at least a small winner on the outside is “Hold Still,” which despite its brevity, seems to drone onward even when it’s poked by acoustic guitar clatter. Slide that one into the filler folder.
Late in the proceedings, we get some respite with the catchy thumping guitar hook of “While You Wait for the Others.” It also features one of the album’s best lines: “You could beg for forgiveness/As long as you like/Or just wait out the evening/And always ask me why/Yes, you’ll only leave me dry/So I’ll ask you kindly to make your way.” Then the album ends on a stellar high note with “Foreground,” which has a delicate piano melody underpinned by muted strings and a steady, echoing pulse. Each element sounds so natural against the other (including halo-sporting backups and a shuffling rattle) that it almost makes up for every botched experiment before it. Simplicity suits them and it’s a darkly lovely song.
There’s no denying the larger scale of Veckatimest, which finds Grizzly Bear in a full band mood, letting Chris Taylor and Christopher Bear climb into the spotlight of songwriters Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen (fresh from his Department of Eagles stint, which I also found to be somewhat less than the highly favorable consensus), and they share it without fuss. They’ve also described the album as being “sunnier,” which is accurate as well. But a lack of tempo shifts and grand compositions during the longer-than-it-actually-is midsection hint that no matter the attention to detail and eclectic talents of the foursome, they are still lacking a few good tricks. Half of the songs are great, but that still means the album is only half great. Make an EP out of it that’ll turn Friend into the hastily assembled outtake collection it should have sounded like and relegate the rest to your shuffle. It did wonders for “Cheerleader.”
"Veckatimest" is on sale May 26, 2009 from Warp.
