<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If we\u2019re comparing pieces of pop culture, and who doesn\u2019t like doing that, then The New Pornographers must be music\u2019s answer to Saturday Night Live. Venerable outfits of talented performers, both feature a collective which accomplish a certain majesty together but whose members are always looking for a way to excel individually on their own terms. Will Ferrell and A.C. Newman, Tina Fey and Neko Case, Adam Sandler and Dan Bejar \u2013 all forged identities not tied to their weighty anchors, even though the weighty anchors gave them the chance to do just that.<\/p>\n
Kathryn Calder, who came to the Pornographers as a sub for Neko but has remained for a half-dozen years, doesn\u2019t have the star power of her bandmates but has attained a consistency and merit to her work. The release of Bright and Vivid, Calder\u2019s second solo album, shows the Canadian singer trying to establish herself outside the mother ship \u2014 and while she has yet to reach Kristen Wiig status, she isn\u2019t slumming with Victoria Jackson.<\/p>\n
Calder is clearly at play here, moving through gritty shoegaze, dancey synths, dream pop and quaint folk songs at a brisk clip. The opening \u201cOne, Two, Three\u201d is a pile of layered sounds \u2014 Wall of Sound drums, acoustic guitar, fuzzy feedback \u2014 which is jolted into more traditional territory when Calder\u2019s voice does filter in. It\u2019s an odd choice to begin the album, though, as Calder takes a back seat to the swirling noise around her. I thought the whole idea of a solo album is to push the artist to the forefront.<\/p>\n
Sure enough, the synth-laden \u201cWho Are You?\u201d has Calder leading the charge in a song very different than the first (maybe she was transitioning from cast player to lead actor). It\u2019s a strong pop song with a killer hook, handled ably by Calder\u2019s sweet voice.<\/p>\n
The album is at its best when Calder is experimenting with landscapes, allowing her voice to meld with tempo at hand. The excellent \u201cAll the Things\u201d is a sonic journey, as her Julee Cruise meets Sunny Day in Glasgow groove gives way to soaring guitars, thumping bass and finally a series of electronic ticks. It\u2019s six-minutes long containing three songs in one \u2013 and is all weird and wonderful.<\/p>\n
The penultimate \u201cFive More Years\u201d is another example of Calder\u2019s mischievous song writing. It\u2019s the album\u2019s catchiest and spookiest track, dominated by eerie strings and rushing water but kept taut by Calder\u2019s bright singing. I returned to it several times to decipher all the fun bits stuck deep in the background.<\/p>\n
And maybe that\u2019s the point. Now in the lead, Calder wants you aware of what goes on behind the scenes, since her reason for being here now started with her being back there then.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If we\u2019re comparing pieces of pop culture, and who doesn\u2019t like doing that, then The New Pornographers must be music\u2019s answer to Saturday Night Live. Venerable outfits of talented performers, both feature a collective which accomplish a certain majesty together but whose members are always looking for a way to excel individually on their own […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1442,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[452,451],"class_list":["post-1441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review","tag-bright-and-vivid","tag-kathryn-calder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1441"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1441\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1443,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1441\/revisions\/1443"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abandonedcouches.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}