It was way back in June that Spoon released Got Nuffin, a brief collection that gave us our first taste of Transference via the dusky, percussive rocker that gave the EP its name. A couple of weeks later we heard a live take of “Is Love Forever?.” At the time we said it sounded like more chaotic, dubbed-out early Joe Jackson. A couple of weeks after that we were introduced to “Written In Reverse.” We didn’t have the final title at the time, but we did know it came with noisy guitar, loud piano, fuzzed bass, and one of those repetitious Spoonerisms that you should be aware of at this point. By October we also had a title and complete tracklist for the Austin band’s seventh album. And the songs kept coming. All this to say, will anyone actually be surprised by Transference?
When “The Mystery Zone” surfaced in November Britt Daniel noted:
This is the first record we’ve made without a producer or heavy of any kind and I don’t know for sure because I’ll never hear this record in the same way that someone who didn’t make it will, but I think you can tell it. When I listen to it I think, hey, that’s how I woulda done it! Which is really what you wanna to hear from a band, isn’t it? This one is pure Spoon. For better or worse and all of it.
So before you dug into the William Eggleston-wrapped album you also knew what textures to expect. Still, all the preparation and background is different than sitting down and absorbing it from the eerie organ strains of “Before Destruction” to the crisp “Nobody Gets Me But You.” It’s weirder than Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. And longer. It has the spacious minimalism of parts of Kill The Moonlight, but stripped bare, expanded upon, and stretched. It’s not as “showy” or polished. At the same time, you feel all these different elements finding sharper cohesion.
Look no further than the organ and high-hat opening of “Before Destruction”: The song takes its time and sets a spare, slightly ominous and very dreamy mood. When the organs drops out and we get Daniel’s voice with a guitar, it sounds like he’s in the same room, standing somewhere not to far away from you. This immediacy remains throughout the collection.
Same with inventive production details: Think about the dubbed vocal echoes (and clips) of “Is Love Forever?” and the strange sand-bag flange of the song’s drums beside the crisp guitar pulse. It’s followed by one of the most straightforward tracks, “The Mystery Zone,” allowing an easy breath before the warping organ and prismatic vocals textures of “Who Makes Your Money.” Of course, it’s Spoon’s talent that no matter how many studio tricks they offer up, the songs are all pretty easy listening. (See, for instance, the understated guitar build of “Who Makes Your Money”‘s 2-minute mark. Even a skeleton’s an anthem.)
As you know, “Written In Reverse” tears out, a bona fide rocker with Daniel’s busy throat-shredding falsetto, splashy drums, and piano noise brushed beneath the big guitars. After a late-song pause, it turns more into a party (even before the laughing studio chatter). Again showing a taut sense of dynamics, it’s followed by the bottled energy of “I Saw The Light.” People will have sex to this song (and feel pretty classy doing it during the piano breakdown).
“Trouble Comes Running” would work well on Ga Ga and Kill and in an indie film. After the climactic anthem we get the dusky piano ballad/lullaby “Goodnight Laura” (strings, tears) and “Out Go The Lights,” which also finds Daniel making sure you rest well and keep your chin up and proud. The pick-scraping sound and deep echo of the late-song percussion add some extra gorgeousness. The album ends with a song you know well by now — soulful, raucous, piano-spattered “Got Nuffin” — and “Nobody Gets Me But You,” which adds subtle layers until the layers aren’t as subtle and you’re getting chopped black of noise atop the tight rhythms.
Again, it doesn’t matter how many Spoon songs you hear live prior to a release: These guys treat the studio like a lab. Seeing how the songs work together and fall apart in the right places it what makes Spoon Spoon …. and Daniel was right: They do a good job being themselves on this one.
Transference is due 1/19 via Merge. You can stream it at NPR right now. You’ll also find the “Written In Reverse” B-Side “Mean Red Spider” floating around:
(via We All Want Something To Shout For)
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FYI, it’s due out on the 19th.
Disappointed at first because I felt like the best songs are songs we already heard before and we know really well by now. After repeated listens, other great moments start to pop up, like the bass in “Trouble Comes Running” and some of those great, extended, minimalist Spoon jams and grooves in “Out Go the Lights” and “I Saw the Light.”
I’m not the biggest Spoon fan in the worlld. I think much of the internet media makes too much of them. I have to admit that Spoon has yet to make a bad album. Transference is a good album and I would recommend the album to people who are looking for a good guitar album. “The Mystery Zone”, “I Saw The Light”, and Nobody Gets Me But You” were my favorites. Britt Daniel is a great frontman, one of the best in the indie rock scene.
I gonna say nobody gets me but you is the track that stands out the most to me
Another good album. It’s said all the time, but these guys truly are one of the most consistent bands around.
In fact, Metacritic recently declared them the artist of the decade: http://features.metacritic.com/features/2009/best-music-of-the-decade/
Very scientific.
I’ve already seen backlash on this record, and it’s something I don’t understand. They push the quirks up front for sure, so it’s not as instant as Gimmie Fiction, but these songs are wonderful. Spoon is the most consistently solid band of our time, second only to Radiohead and Wilco (debatable). Absolutely solid. All the albums have been growers for me and this is no exception, but it’s clear that the little idiosyncrasies will continue to charm, they way they do on every Spoon record.
They have such a strange subtlety. Captivating.
Death, Taxes, and Spoon consistently putting out a great album that is always different yet always Spoon.
i’ve been listening to this album pretty much nonstop since friday and i really enjoyed this review. i think you highlighted perfectly what makes it so great. definitely agree that these guys are one of the most consistent bands of our time. still coming around to “nobody gets me but you” though.
It just sounds like they are chasing there own tail at this point. Its kind of sad, they were a great band at one point.
I don’t know if its the lack of a producer or what, but despite all the tracks there are very few actual songs on this album. The first few times Iistenned to it, I felt like track 5 was the first full-fledged song on the album. Most tracks are just long meandering and repetitive grooves that never really go anywhere. They sound more like recordings of a band trying out sketches of songs early in the songwriting process than the end results of a full album by an established band.
In the end, I think it makes very decent background music, especially for driving, but I don’t see many, if any, of these songs making onto mixes, playlists, DJ sets, or the radio.
That’s a real shame because Spoon was great and creating very tight and well-crafted songs. Or maybe, as it turns out, their producer was.
“This is the first record we’ve made without a producer or heavy of any kind and I don’t know for sure because I’ll never hear this record in the same way that someone who didn’t make it will, but I think you can tell it. When I listen to it I think, hey, that’s how I woulda done it! Which is really what you wanna to hear from a band, isn’t it? This one is pure Spoon. For better or worse and all of it.”
Interesting point Britt but producers sometimes shed new light to an album by providing new ideas that will take your music in new directions the band would’ve never thought about. Not saying producing your own record is bad or anything but if your album stinks, there’s nobody to blame but yourself.
Really good take on the album. Spoon does indeed have a great track record over the years and this record continues that. I wasn’t that impressed on first listen, but it has definitely grown on me after a couple listens. It’s not the most exciting or challenging album to come out and might not make them any new fans, but i think it’s still a really solid record that will probably be in my rotation until i burn out on it like Ga.
i say this with sorrow, as a longtime Spoon fan: this album is awful. one stillborn “song” after another. spoon has never been a chorus band and has always had unique, riff-driven songs, but britt just has NO songwriting ideas on this album. you can feel desperation sinking in on some of these songs (some will call it experimentation, “the manifestation of the sorrow of a breakup,” or some other hogwash, and that’s fine, think what you will, but these songs are deadly dull and woefully uninspired). i think we cursed Spoon with all those “they’re sooooo consistent” statements. disappointing.
I was really looking forward to this album, and I have to say it has me kind of disappointed. Oh well, I guess even Spoon can have an off album.
“Trouble Comes Running” would work well on Ga Ga and Kill and in an indie film.” Is this whole review a joke? Have you thought of hiring writers who write actual music criticism? I guess I should be glad it didn’t use the phrase “Bitches Brew-isms.”
To those not liking it, might I suggest 3 complete listens? Truly great albums tend to grow over a few listens. I’ve listened a dozen times or so now and I’m completed captivated by it.
I’m also completeLY captivated by it.
i was worried about the lack of a producer on this record, especially after hearing “written in reverse”. self-editing is difficult stuff, and from this album it definitely doesn’t seem like britt and co. have their finger on the pulse of brevity – but i guess that’s never really been what spoon has done. i agree that this album grows with multiple listens.
it was going to be hard for spoon to follow up ga ga ga ga ga, i had extremely high hopes after hearing initial reports that britt was working with jon brion, and was disappointed to find it didn’t work out. what these songs may lack in hooks and melody, the gain in exploring tension and release – it’s good, just not as immediately gratifying. (somewhere there is a happy medium – see wilco’s a ghost is born, jim o’rourke’s eureka…)
bonus points for the mind fuck vocal editing.
What a great album! I love it!
This Spoon album reminds me of Kanye’s “808s and Heartbreaks”. It’s kind of minimal sounding, especially compared to their last album, and will probably polarize some Spoon fans.
Spoon Tranference (and I am a sucker for anagrams)=
Penance for Stoners
second half of Transference > first half of Transference
I agree. And I feel that that NEVER happens with albums. I can only think of a couple that have stronger second halves.
Police – Syncronicity
I’m loving it too, awesome album.
it’s a grower, definatly. Third time was the charm for me. It doesn’t have any killer singles like ga ga ga ga ga but as a whole I dig the vibe more. It feels a little darker not in a bad way but in the sense that its not uplifting like some of the ga ga ga ga ga songs. I havent heard anyone talk about it yet but “who makes your money” I think is a really great song that could be easy to ignor on first listen but i would have to say its been the most rewarding song for me.
Don’t believe the naysayers, I’m loving this! Especially the first half, with its sparse, experimental focus, and vocal mix-ups and harmonies (cf Before Destruction, Is Love Forever?), it’s more Kill the Moonlight than any album since. The Mystery Zone has this great 70s pop viba, almost like a stripped indie-rock Off the Wall influence. We get some lovely sugar-sweet-Spoon-pop in Written in Reverse. Trouble Comes Running is just beautiful, indie-pop, that breezes along effortlessly – possibly the best on the album! The last half has some sweet come down tunes (Goodnight Laura, Out Go the Lights), and lots more bass than I expected (Nobody Gets Me But You). I think it will have good replay value, and will feature highly in this years musical pickings!
I guess I am in the minority here. Its a great record. Out go the lights is the highlight of the record. Flawless song
Amazing album. I’ve never really liked previous Spoon records, think this is the one I’ve been waiting for. Agreed on the second half being better than the first, ‘Out Go The Lights’ and ‘Nobody Gets Me But You’ are masterpieces.
Spoon cannot record a bad, or even mediocre album. I have listened to this 2-3 times a day since NPR streamed it, and am now listening to the Itunes version (purchased with Christmas gift cards of course). I love this album, but I have no idea where to rank to it in the band’s catalog, they all have their own endearing properties. To all the haters that trashed this album and Spoon along with it, you just don’t get it, and I pity you for that.
it’s dark and sexy. those who hate are looking for instant gratification. it’s understandable, you’re too shallow for this album.
I don’t understand all the negative comments. I love this album, it’s brilliant.
Not as good as A Series of Sneaks, their best IMHO. But better than most of their other records. If you don’t have it yet, get it.
can’t wait to see Spoon in Toronto March 29th… I’ve been waiting a while to seem them live now
Good comment. Very critical.
It’s been rewarding to see Spoon grow musically and expand its audience over the past decade though solid albums, and not Internet hysteria. They remain “cool” and “indie” and sorta mysterious, which is rare these days. Please never join Twitter, Britt.
//
“Mr. Daniel continues to be uncompromising about the crafting of rock ?n? roll, about what constitutes cool. Shooting the video, for ‘Written in Reverse,’ was not. ‘We don?t have any good videos,’ he said. ‘What?s your criteria for a good video?’ Mr. Harvey asked. Mr. Daniel: ‘Is Devo in it?’”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/arts/music/10spoon.html
I don’t know guys. I think I’m just going to wait for Pitchfork to tell me what to think.
Forget this album – it’s boring as bathwater. In better news, Scott uses his avatar as Hader as Buckingham and this, my friends, is brilliant.
For a more articulate response, I’ll just say this: Some music isn’t always for everyone and Spoon falls under that category for me. I’ve tried countless amounts of times to get into them going back to their most earliest releases, but nothing hits the right note with me. I get bored listening to them, and only really enjoy them when they are at their most accessible, which I personally think isn’t so fun because I like to be challenged. I’ve seen them live, and they don’t do much for me, either. They play well, no doubt, and perhaps had I been listening to them in a small bar, it might be more palpable. I admire their style and exuding “coolness”, but then that image got crushed for me when this annoying snobby girl who works in the music industry told me she had an affair with one of the band members.
* I can’t confirm the validity of the last line since crazy girls will say crazy things but you never really know what to believe in the music biz.
More articulate response appreciated!
I think Kill The Moonlight is their best by far, incidentally.
Britt Daniel is notorious, would not surprise me if that was the band member.
i lost all respect for lady gaga after i found out i had an affair with her, true story