Another good story on one of my fave bands
THE STILLS!
Ottawa Sun - April 7th/04
It may well be the perfect pop album for today. Self-pitying lyrics, Coldplay-worthy falsetto crooning, layer upon layer of jangly guitar riffs -- The Stills' irresistible Logic Will Break Your Heart makes it all sound so easy.
You can learn a lot about people from how they remember the 1980s, that synthetic pop decade that refuses to leave. Especially when they weren't exactly around for it the first time around.
At 25, The Stills' singer-guitarist Tim Fletcher can't claim to have been frequenting Montreal's Foufounes Electriques or Club Soda during that misunderstood decade. But no matter: Fletcher and bandmates Dave Hamelin (drums), Greg Paquet (guitar) and Oliver Crowe (bass) have come up with their own 1980s. And in many ways, it sounds much better.
Not that the 12 songs on Logic Will Break Your Heart, recorded in New York with fellow Canuck Gus Van Go at the helm, are derivative. It may be fun to listen for echoes of The Jesus and Mary Chain (at the beginning of Lola Stars and Stripes), New Order (Changes Are No Good), The Smiths (the clever fade-in of the bitter Allison Krausse) and The Cure (just about everything). But the songwriting of Fletcher and Hamelin is strong enough to ward off all accusations of predictability.
"I think, early on, bands like The Pixies, The Clash and Belle and Sebastian were really what we were listening to," Fletcher says.
"And yeah, some of the '80s stuff that we get referred to -- Echo and the Bunnymen, Duran Duran, The Cure, The Smiths -- were things that were in our musical subconscious."
But, he asserts, "we never listened to Joy Division." And, as the Belle and Sebastian tip confirms, it has never been all-'80s-all-the-time for The Stills.
Indeed, the Montrealers honed their skills in the fertile musical ground of New York City, watching and learning as they shared bills with the likes of The Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
"That's where we earned a couple of our stripes," Fletcher says of the Big Apple. "Our managers are from Montreal, but live in New York, and upon hearing some of the compositions Dave and I had been working on, they encouraged us to come down. It was like, 'What are you doing? Don't waste your time there; come to New York and we'll see what can come of us working on music together.' "
What came of the band's N.Y.C. adventure was a deal with Vice Recordings, with distribution by Warner Music, and a promising EP, The Rememberese, that offered a taste of the band's gifts for adding melancholy sentiments to catchy tunes.
By the time of Logic, The Stills were doing everything right.
Nothing to it, really, Fletcher shrugs.
"We know how to craft songs and we know how to produce them in a certain way," Fletcher says, adding that the band's early material was far more experimental. "I think when the label heard the record, they were surprised by how accessible it is. But it's our first record and that's what we thought it should be."
Again, The Stills make it all sound so easy. And each new set of ears brings a new convert. But, Fletcher notes, pop stardom doesn't mean the band can forever suppress its experimental tendencies -- musically or lyrically.
"Right now," he says, "we're in a box that confines us. It's self-imposed, in a certain way, but we want to break out of that box and step into more open and creative territory.
"That record reflects the headspace we were in at the time of writing those songs. And it really succeeded in that realm. It is moody; there is a certain pessimism.
"But it's a pretty underdeveloped and simplistic take on emotions, to a certain degree. It's time to move on to new emotional territory and new moods. We won't repeat ourselves."
