Said The Whale
In the five years since Canadian 5-piece Said The Whale formed, the band's hook-heavy, pop-rock sound has propelled them to successes that include a nationally televised documentary, a 2011 JUNO Award victory (for New Group Of The Year), and a seemingly endless series of tours around the globe.
In an age of overnight internet sensations, theirs is a true grassroots success story that has allowed the group - featuring dual front men Tyler Bancroft and Ben Worcester, drummer Spencer Schoening, keyboardist Jaycelyn Brown and bassist Nathan Shaw - to take its place among the indie rock elite. Audiences all around the world quickly took notice of the fast-rising musicians, who toured the U.K. and earned support across the media, including BBC 6 Music.
Following the teaser EP New Brighton, their new full-length album Little Mountain, is to be released on 2nd July 2012 via Hidden Pony Records. It is the band’s third full-length for the label.
Named after the band's neighbourhood in Vancouver, the 15-track collection was recorded at the city's Blue Wave Productions studio with returning producer Tom Dobrzanski (The Zolas, We Are the City) and multiple Grammy award-winning mixer Jack Joseph Puig. The end result is Said The Whale’s most adventurous effort yet.
With juggernaut production values, intricate songs that explode out of the speakers, gorgeous vocal harmonies and tracks that blend seamlessly into one another, it finds the group defying rock conventions without sacrificing any of their pop smarts.
More diverse than previous albums, Little Mountain is a multi-stylistic tour-de-force that ventures into everything from soaring, horn-laden cabaret ("The Reason") to jaggedly syncopated rock ("We Are 1980") and effervescent guitar pop ("Loveless").
As always, singers Bancroft and Worcester retain their unique voices, but their work has never sounded so cohesive. The track list was carefully selected for front-to-back listening, and the quintet’s all-inclusive collaborative approach to songwriting helped to forge the bond between noisy electric stompers and intimate acoustic ballads.
"Ben and I came to the table with our songs in more of an unfinished state than usual, which allowed the rest of the band to be a little more creative," observes Bancroft.
The album even includes drummer Schoening’s lead vocal debut on the flat-out-gorgeous piano serenade "Seasons," the band's first-ever track sung by a member other than the two front men.
Little Mountain is shaping up to be one of the landmark indie rock albums of 2012. And if the last five years have taught us anything, it's that Said The Whale will continue to win over audiences the old fashioned way: with relentless touring, killer songs, and big-hearted passion.