Always just slightly a few weeks behind the times, I downloaded from iTunes The Dears new album No Cities Left. It took a couple of listens but it’s quite a strong and sophisticated album, except for the occasional dumb-ass lyric. The musical styles purposefully switch, as do the lead singers, but I don’t hold it against them any more than I do U2 or other ambitious bands. It’s hard to say everything you want to say the way The Strokes do, after all.
The Dears, which perform well at many venues, is a Montreal-based boy-girl band that mix up a range of styles and musiques. Here are the apparently references: Blur, The Smiths, Leonard Cohen, Clash, Godspeed You Black Emperor, TMBG maybe. They were recently nicely featured on NPR and their moodiness, odd orchestrations, and full sound all feel appropriate to these mixed up times. My bet is that Leonard Cohen would like this album quite a bit.