Peter Bjorn and John
Living Thing
Rating: 3.0
Label: Columbia Records
buy it at insound!
Perhaps 2006 was a very special year for me – one that found me going particularly soft. Peter Bjorn and John’s third release Writer’s Block struck me as a milestone record, one that sounded about as good as millennial indie rock could get. Maybe the Too Cool for School got sick of hearing the whistle-happy breakout hit “Young Folks,” but that was ultimately their loss. In the midst of missing out on “Young Folks”‘ frantic bongo percussion, lovestruck male/female vocals and soaring string accompaniment, the nay-sayers were also missing out on a small dose of the album’s entire point, illustrated beautifully: the dizzying heights of brand-new love and the icy, lonely lows of relationships broken and irreparable.
Since then, “Young Folks” made it into commercials and Kanye raps, bassist/producer Bjorn Yttling helped introduce Lykke Li into the indie consciousness and PB&J released the digital-only, instrumental-only Seaside Rock , meaning that no one heard it who had no interest in seeking it out in the first place. As it’s getting a full-blown release, Living Thing is meant to be recognized, I’d wager, as the true follow-up to Writer’s Block, maybe because those three Scandinavians are cognizant of the fact that this previous record was toweringly good and an adequate successive outing could never touch it. If all this speculation I’ve thrust on them is the least bit plausible, they’d be right.
There’s things to like about Living Thing, but ultimately, it stands in the shadow of Writer’s Block’s cinematic scope. As this is the case, it gets easily lost. Instead of the diverse, lush instrumentation giving life to lyrics illustrating a virtual line graph of a romantic relationship’s lifespan, Living Thing attempts to be a dance record, rich in rhythmic excitations but ultimately short on substance. Opener “The Feeling” is fueled by handclaps and kick drum while its change-inspired lyrics may as well be the companion song to Pepsi’s Obama rip-off brand redesign. As if to give some credence to the possibility of their ad men-like savvy, first single “Nothing to Worry About” seems to lift the teen girl vocal stylings found on 2007′s inescapable hit by Justice- “D.A.N.C.E.”
On another Bjorn-sung song, “I’m Losing My Mind,” mundane lyrics ride over fuzz bass and pounding drums that are the most aggressive, darkest-toned sounds on the record. On the majority of his songs, a kind of glib banality outfits the vocals. The melancholy, love-bruised singer of those songs three years ago now sounds awkward, singing, “Hey, shut the fuck up boy/ You’re starting to piss me off” in his Nordic accent in “Lay it Down,” and later “Beat me up/ At least you won’t be out of touch.” His vocals are entirely too self-conscious to pull off the bravado or aggression these lines demand, when they aren’t facile to begin with. “Blue Period Picasso,” with its comparison of the girl who stole his heart to a famous art thief, are entirely too strained.
PB&J’s knack for catchy arrangements can’t be denied. The lyrical guitar on “I Want You!” sounds like the guitar from Big Country, if you can possibly imagine that sound understated in any way. The title track does, in fact, quote Electric Light Orchestra above heavily treated guitar scratch and bass groans straight out of “You Can Call Me Al.” “Just the Past,” on the other hand, wouldn’t be far off from the sound of Peter Gabriel’s Security, standing out as the record’s best track. It is, incidentally, the most Writer’s Block of these songs. It’s built on an everyday moment of genuine concern between two highly domesticated lovers. It’s this sweet rendering of the romantic commonplace into an evocative pop song where Peter Bjorn and John are at their strongest.
by Chris Middleman
