The New Pornographers
An Indie Rock and/or Power Pop (depending on who you ask) Supergroup with origins in Vancouver, BC. Formed in the late Nineties, they released their first album, Mass Romantic, in 2000.
Being as they are a supergroup, all of the members had significant careers before the band started, and most still do. However, the band really launched them up into the heights of indie fame.
Lineup:
- Dan Bejar (of Destroyer, Swan Lake, and Hello, Blue Roses)- Vocals, keyboards, multi-instrumentals
- A. C. Newman (solo, and also Zumpano and Superconductor) - Vocals, guitar, more or less everything else
- John Collins (of The Evaporators) - Bass, guitar, more or less everything else
- Kathryn Calder (of Immaculate Machine)- Vocals, piano, other keyboards
- Neko Case (solo, and also Maow, Corn Sisters and Cub) - Vocals
- Kurt Dahle (of Limblifter and Age of Electric) - Drums, assorted percussion
- Todd Fancey (solo, and also Limblifter) - Guitar, mandolin, banjo
- Blaine Thurier (former filmmaker) - Some really freakin' weird instruments. And a sampler.
Most songs are written by Newman, with Bejar and Collins making a few contributions on most albums.
Discography:
- Mass Romantic (2000)
- Electric Version (2003)
- Twin Cinema (2005)
- Challengers (2007)
- Together (2010)
Tropes associated with this band include:
- Droste Image: They used TV monitors to create this effect in the video for "Letter From an Occupant."
- Leave the Camera Running: The music video for "Crash Years" features a static aerial view of a portion of a brick street, as people walk by holding umbrellas, riding on bicycles and other miscellaneous stuff happens below the camera.
- Lyrical Shoehorn: A.C. Newman takes this trope and just runs with it. He's admitted that a lot of his lyrics don't really mean anything, that he just uses whatever sounds best in the song, or will use certain words because their vowels and consonants go well with a melody.
- Dan Bejar sometimes does this with his songs, but more often his lyrics are very much representative of his work as Destroyer. In which case, it's a very weird world he lives in. Enough to create a drinking game out of it.
- Real Song Theme Tune: The Hour previously used "Use It" (off of Twin Cinema) before switching to "The Good In Everyone" by Sloan.
- Supergroup: As previously noted.
- Surreal Music Video: The one for "Myriad Harbor" follows a man with a giant head of hair that grows without control, eventually growing other heads that all start singing in unison. Also counts as Deranged Animation.
- It's Dan Bejar!
- Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Subversion of this: Neko Case remains a member of the band as female lead. However, her other commitments (being an alt-country heroine, or a whacked-out pop princess) does mean she is not always available to tour with the band. Part of the reason Kathryn Calder was hired was to serve as female lead on tour, so that they could tour independently of Neko's schedule. Only recently has Kathryn begun to sing lead on some songs that weren't Neko's.
- Title Drop: The first three albums all opened with songs with the same title as the album (well, the song was called "The Electric Version," but let's not split hairs, shall we?), which also included the album title as a lyric in the song. Challengers also had a song entitled "Challengers," but it was the third track.
- "Together" is a weird case, since depending how you look at it, it can either have no title song or two title songs. There is no one song called Together, but there are the songs "Your Hands (Together)" and the closing song "We End Up Together".
- Token Minority: Neko Case is a Token American in a Canadian band (born in Virginia, raised in Washington State).
- Word Salad Lyrics: Again, A.C. Newman's songs often end up like this.