Degeneration Street
After stripping down to a duo for 2008’s *Missiles*, the Dears are once again at full force and more playful than ever. “5 Chords” trends towards Arcade Fire arena-pop, while “Blood” emanates from a mix of post-punk influences, giving them a sound that’s closer to the proto-‘80s vibe of Editors and Interpol than the Britpop mannerisms of their 2003 release *No Cities Left*, where the group measured somewhere between Pulp and Blur. Those influences can still be heard sporadically on the Radiohead-like crawl of “Galactic Tides,” the Tim Buckley-on-sedatives wail of “Lamentation” and the lurching groan of the title track. A few other moments scale down the arena ambitions. “Tiny Man” has a nicely static retro-organ stabilizing the frothy bounce. “Easy Suffering” adds a bit of jangle to its wall of sound. But the overall tone is of a band looking to break past their humble Montreal beginnings and find the keys to the coliseum as “Torches,” “Stick w/ Me Kid” and “Omega Dog” suggest. The Dears have apparently re-grouped to reinvent themselves once more.
Dears founder Murray A. Lightburn continues to persevere after his band nearly split, and here he delivers a record with lofty aims and goals.
Murray Lightburn makes no small gestures. That isn’t necessarily a shortcoming, considering how he and The Dears fire “Thrones” into its pre-chorus with the words “Not a single one of us has the guts to bear a cross.” That line would leave a simpler singer with nothing but pure feigned insolence, but Lightburn is…
The Dears' last album, 2008’s Missiles, came at a fractious time in the band’s history.
Such is the intensity of producing a Dears album, that the band reaches breakpoint at every conclusion.