Wolf Parade
Expo 86
(Sub Pop)
Wolf Parade’s third release, Expo 86, is a get out of your seats and move! record. The Montreal tandem singer-songwriters Dan Boeckner and Spencer Krug set out to make a record that made you dance and that conquest has been met in spades. Expo 86 is fast and poppy and epileptic, in a good way.
Some critics with high expectations of this it-indie band give harsher than necessary reviews of this cohesive, solid record, saying Expo 86 doesn’t sparkle like 2005’s Apologies to the Queen Mary, but like this writer has said before, let’s not punish the ones we love for doing what they do that we love. Where do you want Wolf Parade to go? They’ve made two delicious records, and countless others with their varying side projects, carving out their discrete sound. With Expo 86 they give us 11 more tracks with the WP touch and add to a catalogue of strong showings.
In the universe of this record, Expo 86 represents a kind of utopian equality. Dan and Spencer share top billing, as usual, and there a perfect number of fast jams and mellower tracks. Even Steven. There were rumors that WP wrote so many good tracks we might get a double release (and that’s not yet the case) but the picks that made the cut are palpably synergistic. Nothing throws off a stellar record more than a shit song (official journalist term) that just fills up the minutes. Pleasantly, you will find no shit songs on Expo 86.
Highlights include the opener, “Cloud Shadow on the Mountain,” “Little Golden Age,” “Pobody’s Nerfect,” and “Yulia.”
In addition to starting off the record with a swift and speedy kick in the ass, “Cloud Shadow on the Mountain” delivers some crazy good psychedelic lyrics like “I was asleep in a hammock. I was dreaming that I was a web. I was a dream-catcher hanging in the window of a minivan parked by the water's edge, I’d say that I was all alone” and “You gotta jump over the island like a new long legged gazelle. But you will never be born as a scorpion.” They got me at the first second (and not just because I’m a sucker for animal imagery). This track has that tangible Doors’ essence that sprung those LA rockers into the lizard king status with their experimental psychotropia. Here, WP mesh the esoteric with the accessible and the result is a rocking achievement.
Likewise, “Little Golden Age” breaks the doors down and has the legs to be a hit single. A catchy “oooohhh oooohhh” intro and sticky beat make the four and a half minute track superbly infectious. Nostalgic lyrics like, “And we hung around in the parking lot in the parking lot stoned, stars shone out of phase, And the rain came down, cassettes wore out, Oh No!” grab those of us who actually remember the 80s and get us thinking about Back to the Future and our own golden ages and when MTV played music.
“Pobody’s Nerfect” starts out with as much a Springsteen vibe as any song I’ve heard. I gather the reference is nearly exhausted but here it must be made. That lasts just seconds, though, and Dan comes in with his urgency and Spencer patiently plays a flittering set of keys while the song builds and builds. A sexy rhythm guitar floats about and keeps the track grounded.
“Yulia” is simply a gorgeous love song – about a widow to the Russian space program. Hear it now.
Expo 86 is insidious and wants to get under your skin like a disease. Let it.
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