So a couple of weeks ago I had the chance to chat with Jason McGerr, drummer for Death Cab for Cutie, and he was totally awesome, and on his way to band practice at 10:30 a.m.–seriously, what band do you know that practices that early?
“We’re like that. We have blue collared shirts for practice,” he quipped.
The story is on the Monday cover for the Your Life section, but he had some interesting things to say that didn’t make the story.
On the industry:
A few weeks ago, the band was filming the video for “I Will Possess Your Heart” in a fish locker in Los Angeles and the owner brought his two daughters by to the shoot. McGerr never assumes that someone has the band’s last record so he asked the girl and she told him “I only have one song.” It was “Soul Meets Body.”
“People stopped listening to full albums and records a while ago,” McGerr said.
He said the conversation he had with the girl is happening more and more, but he likened it to the 1950s and 1960s, when a hit could make a band.
But there are still people who like the experience of listening to an album and he compared the work of an album to that of a written work.
“You can’t pull out a chapter and say, ‘That’s a really good book,'” he said.
On the new album:
The band’s sixth album, “Narrow Stairs,” is due out in May.
“It’s got a lot more electric guitar–a lot more teeth,” McGerr said.
While “Plans” was an all-digital album, “Narrow Stairs” was done on tape, which, McGerr pointed out, while some people think it’s new and usual, it’s been done for decades, even with recent discs like the new Raconteurs record and Wilco’s “Sky Blue Sky.”
McGerr said the album is different than “Plans” partially because the band took off for a time after touring before heading back into the studio.
“In taking a year off from playing we were able to reset the clock,” he said.
Death Cab guitarist Chris Walla was also at the helm of producer this time around.
The only addition Will Markwell, the band’s front of sound house guy, who worked on engineering the record.
“It was good to have an extra set of ears to be aware of what we’d do well,” McGerr said.
On Coachella:
Coachella is going to be the band’s first big show in over a year, according to McGerr.
“Having the sunset crowd at Coachella–that’s going to be awesome,” he said. “How could you have a bad time at a festival like that?”