They’ll want their own unions next! Is it, we ask, completely out of the question to expect two representative forces at loggerheads over the introduction of guaranteed regulation encore breaks at BSS gigs, to be enforced with immediate effect lest there be strike action? With specific expectations for uncramped performance conditions left open for continued discussion. Probably? Maybe not? Either way, cheap speculation aside, the evolution of ‘the band’ over recent years has made for fascinating viewing. And right now we could be about to reach its nadir, with Canada of all places leading the charge in this spanking new tidal-wave of community music.
So this is community music, but not as we know it. Less worthy, but with equally good intentions. Less rehabilitation, more jubilation. Less about necessity and shell-suits, more just doing it in a group for the sheer bloody rush of it all. Following the definitive outpourings of the Polyphonic Spree, the shifting grooves of native Canadian mass-supergroup The New Pornographers and the untethered enormity of the Arcade Fire’s indie orchestra, all pivoting around their own central focuses, Broken Social Scene’s sometime 18-member rolling line-up is perhaps the most spontaneous and free.
Our understanding of smaller bands – 4 pieces, duos even – are of classic roles, control, individual capability and the correspondence between these defined elements, no matter how anarchic or devilish. Broken Social Scene’s roots are in conformity, the songs are not completely off the scale, being clearly influenced by regular bands with sideways perspectives, but what they do that is so special is to actually utilise the spirit in which they are formed. They convey perfectly the immense thrill of being amongst a crowd, of sharing a moment with tens, hundreds, thousands of others like you, and of there being no limit to the abandon you feel. They work that sensation into a succession of excited shapes, wide-eyed and eager, with an attractive, blissful slacker demeanour.
‘Ibi Dreams Of Pavement’ track two admits, amid a riotous scrum of gleefully groaning guitars, and they’re not the only one. The 90s indie heroes inform much on the album – on the outrageously overflowing ‘7/4 (Shoreline)’, brittle and jaunty ‘Our Faces Split The Coast In Half’ and the incomparably awesome ‘It’s All Gonna Break’ especially – the latter also sounding from certain vantage points like Jon Spencer dismembering Belle & Sebastian. Take also Sleater Kinney and Liars (‘Windsurfing Nation’), Low and Belly (‘Swimmers’) and Portishead and TV on the Radio (‘Hotel’). Then add brass, loads of it, euphoric brass, wherever it will fit.
Though the pace differs, there’s never a static moment, it’s a serious surplus of ideas like they’re play-wrestling recording time from each other. Even the most sparse track on the record, the Eliot Smith-esque folktronica of ‘Major Label Debut’, is a widescreen waterfall of helium-laced intricacy. It’s like a shot from every optic on the top shelf of the Indie Bar, in a pint glass, down in one, and then dancing all night. And who really gives a damn about the hangover in the morning?
The first truly great record of 2006. One suspects it may hold that crown for a while.