Apr 02 2004
Sleep Station: After the War
Sort of.
That’s the one phrase I keep using over and over again as I describe Sleep Station to my friends. For what they do and how they do it, this seems to be the best way I can talk about their music, in short, once the details surface there is nothing ’sort of’ about them.
What Sleep Station does to create their albums is sort of mind blowing. How in touch their lyrics are with the subject matter is sort of brilliant. The lengths they will go to make the finished product as close to their muse as possible is sort of obsessive. If you’ve never heard of these guys then this is about as much of a precursor as you will need to understand what all is going on here. Now onto their fifth release (fourth full-length album), the band’s latest success, After the War, will be released on May 17th.
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Track listing:
01 Introduction 02 After the War 03 Drums of War 04 Caroline, London 1940 05 Waiting 06 Come Back Again 07 My Darling 08 Burden to You 09 All That Remains 10 Silver in the Sun 11 A Final Prayer 1 12 A Final Prayer 2 13 A Soldier’s Dream 14 N 49, W 0 15 With You Now 16 Lullaby 17 Goodnight to the Moon |
Explanation time. All of Sleep Station’s musical releases have been based around a story. The lyrics and meanings of the songs are coming out of characters within these stories. It’s like a dramatic musical that you watch with the curtain closed. The stories aren’t just a loose idea that Sleep Station’s lyricist/frontman Dave Debiak decides to work around, they are thought-out, complex, works that have as much detail as they do charisma. The band’s website (www.sleep-station.com) has a complete account of each album’s story and it is near impossible to deny wanting every album after reading of its inspiration. Questions of how they can pull it off immediately flood the mind with the summations working as well as any movie trailer.
So what makes everything so, ’sort of?’ On After the War there is no point where you feel like Sleep Station is trying to hard to make you feel the story or their theme and believe me, they go to graphic extremes in taking you there. Their smooth pop textures remind me of Wilco, Marcy Playground, and even Coldplay at times. When explaining how far off of the beaten path this band is in terms of how they are creating albums, one would expect to hear music like nothing that they ever heard before. I can’t really say that’s true, lyrics excluded obviously. Sleep Station is making movies out of these albums, yes- but they aren’t trying to bring back 3-D. These songs sit very comfortably amongst the best pop music that I’ve heard. Great harmonies, great instrumentation, and excellent production make viewing their latest release a pure pleasure.
After the War is a collection of tunes in 17 tracks that take a listener through the trials and tribulations of World War II. From the soldier and his girl to the soldier and his son, you get a sense that not all of the words spoken here are meant to be viewed as direct dialogue. There is a considerable amount of longing in many of these tunes, giving the impression that these characters are saying things they only wish they’d gotten a chance to in person. What seems like a cut and dry, ‘I love you’ turns into a heart-wrenching gaze towards a missile-filled sky as the message flies to the night in hopes that its recipient will be laying safely asleep thousands of miles away.
All of the emotions of war are here. The fear, the resentment, the worry, the counted blessings, and the promising hope of a better future make more than cameos as faceless characters plead their respective cases to one another, attempting to put each other at ease. It is terribly hard to stop listening to an album like After the War because Sleep Station is giving you so much. Between their prime musicianship and engaging lyrics, you also find haunting sounds of war and struggle wrapped around several moments where ‘found sounds’ directly from war-era 40’s are infused as well. One touching instance is a soldier’s letter home to his girlfriend read out loud in all of its crackled glory. Somehow still, this is just the beginning of this particular record’s authenticity.
Sleep Station gathered as much equipment from the 1940’s as possible for use in recording. Using amps, microphones, and some recording gadgetry of the period, the result is nothing less than pristine. The quality does not suffer once from these tools, now viewed as archaic by modern standards. The work of Sleep Station becomes more understood and more enjoyable as you learn more and more about what these gentlemen are doing to put their stamp on each of their creations. Metteur` en scene this band is not.
So do these songs stand on their own two feet? Just because they have this great concept and go to great lengths to make it authentic, are the songs something to be enjoyed as music and not just literature? Yes, 100%! In an exercise that I’ll knight, “Pop Restraint” they get the blue ribbon and the trophy. Maybe it’s because they have been together through four albums and an EP, maybe they are just smart musicians, but they have avoided all of the idiosyncrancies and idioms that are poisoning the pop gene pool these days. How out of place would songs set in World War II be if the drummer was doing a hip-hop type of beat because that’s what’s catching. The slower songs have a lot to offer by way of their simplicity and the up-tempos efforts are right on the mark.
Dave Debiak is deserving of a purple heart for his lyrical work on After the War. He moves from image to image clearly and makes it hard not to envision his scenes:
“As I flew away I looked back just to see the ground, hopeless in my vision, I never had the chance to say goodbye. I could see that the world is getting small, faces I remember, farther from these ghosts I climb. Always the same, as you would, my minds in pieces awaiting the change. Always the break, you would fall, and forget the secrets you kept, after the war.”
“I will hide this way while bombs drop everyday just close my eyes and wait to die. Forget everything it twists my swollen dreams around my heart it goes. I cling to my pride. They can take our lives, but my soul is yours and mine and I love you Caroline. As the hours break I feel your body shake, I hold my breath as you cry. I miss everyone so much I haven’t done, intentions fall like the rain. I cling to your side. They can take our lives, but my soul is yours and mine and I love you Caroline.”
“Just know that I love you, you have made my heart fill with joy, and I’m just a father who loves his boy. I’ll fall from the sky, I will sit and watch you run for a while, and we don’t have to go nowhere, if you close your eyes you will know that I’m here.”
Creatively, sonically, and in manners of overall execution, this album should be a definite highlight of 2004. As I am now set to work my way backwards through their material, I can’t help but hear the click-clack of an old reel to reel projector washing me into a deep stained brown that is just one step ahead of black-and-white. The usher, in his red hat and handy flashlight gives me the best seat in the house and I’m off to the record store.
FADE OUT
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