There was good reason to question whether Grizzly Bear would ever release another album. In the five years that followed the New York outfit’s 2012 release, Shields, its four members separately pursued a variety of interests, including political campaigning, working in Michelin star restaurants and performing with other musicians.
But the arrival of Grizzly Bear’s fifth LP, Painted Ruins, in August 2017 decisively relieved any such concerns. The prolonged absence didn’t undo the band’s vanguard status, either – a fact affirmed by the quartet’s imminent return to the Sydney Opera House as well as a trip to the Golden Plains music festival.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GI1Mj5O5OjU
Grizzly Bear emerged in the mid-’00s Brooklyn indie scene, standing out from their peers thanks to their sophisticated, ornate style of indie rock. After garnering indie acclaim for 2004’s Horn Of Plenty and 2006’s Yellow House, the major breakthrough came with album number three, Veckatimest, in 2009.
Critical commendation was matched by a swelling fanbase, and there’ve been reduced circumstantial pressures on the group ever since that stunning record was released into the world. However, that doesn’t mean they became any less invested in the work itself.
“It would be impossible to not have some thought of, ‘What are people going to think of this [new album]?’” says drummer Christopher Bear. “But by the time you’ve gotten as far as writing it and recording it and mixing and finishing it and putting all the final touches on it – artwork and all that stuff – at that point you’re thinking about that, but you’re also just elated to finally be putting it out there in the world. It can be such a long process and it’s just really nice to put it out there.
“In the moment sometimes you think, ‘Wow this sounds really different or this is a different palette for us or different type of tune.’ Then, weirdly, after time it starts feeling like, ‘Well it’s different but it still has some of these elements in there that make it feel like what we do.’”
Grizzly Bear have carved out a distinct sound over the last 15 years. Within 30 seconds of Painted Ruins opener ‘Wasted Acres’, the orchestral synth arrangement and Daniel Rossen’s earnest vocals unmistakably mark it as a Grizzly Bear record. But when comparing the new album to its closest companions, Shields and Veckatimest, the differences become quite pronounced – in terms of songwriting, production and overall tone.
Actuating these stylistic modulations isn’t an overly deliberate process, mind you. “There’s never necessarily a plan from the outset saying, ‘Okay this one we’re definitely going to try to use more guitars or have more minimal instrumentation,’” says Bear. “When we’re starting to pass around demos, a little bit of a palette starts to emerge. It naturally starts happening and based on what the demos are as we’re individually working on ideas and passing them around. You start to identify where each other’s at.
We start a little language with instruments and sounds that become reoccurring characters in a record.
“We start feeling out the ideas we’re going to be working on musically. And from there, in the studio, it’s about recording the stuff, and we’re all very [influenced] by what we have around us and what we have access to instrument-wise. We start a little language with instruments and sounds that become reoccurring characters in a record.”
Grizzly Bear records are painstaking productions that typically feature dense layers of instrumentation and harmonised vocals. The band’s also known for their supremely dazzling live shows, as anyone who caught their 2010, 2012 or 2014 Australian tours can surely attest. But despite such advanced technical accomplishments, the band members aren’t immune to self-doubt and insecurities.
“Especially when we’re getting down to the mixing process, I’m always thinking ‘How the fuck are we going to play this live,’” says Bear. “We’ve piled so many instruments on top of each other and in the end it’s just five of us onstage. Even bringing [touring keyboardist Aaron Arntz] into the mix, for some songs there’s still just so much going on to try and figure out how to flesh it out.”
I’m always thinking ‘How the fuck are we going to play this live.’
Concerns about what can be feasibly be performed live will occasionally bring about fortuitous studio revisions, however. “Sometimes making these songs, it’s a process of throwing the kitchen sink at the thing and then stepping back and taking out all the items that feel like too much,” Bear says. “Every now and then the process of taking stuff away ends up breathing so much more new life into something and giving it room to be something different.”
Grizzly Bear has two alternating lead vocalists, guitarist Rossen and band founder Ed Droste, while bassist Chris Taylor has produced each of the last four LPs. Painted Ruins saw Bear become more creatively involved than he had been previously, which resulted in a rhythmically-insistent live sound coming through on a range of tracks (notably the singles ‘Mourning Sound’ and ‘Losing All Sense’).
“A lot of the stuff on the new record that we’re playing live ended up feeling pretty like the record. There’s a lot of elements of the record that we intended as having more of a live feel, more of the experience of the band as we sound live – just having a little bit more of the drums and rhythm section a little more forward. That’s not the case of every tune, but some definitely stemmed as ideas from something that was more of a live jam and less [a case of] constructing it instrument by instrument.”
Grizzly Bear will play Sydney Opera House on Monday March 12.
