Since their formation in 2008, Damaged Bells, comprising the Shins’ James Mercer and prolific producer Brian Burton, aka Hazard Mouse, the duo have risen above the “supergroup” connotation usually assigned to them. In contrast to the subset’s forefathers — Cream, the Highwaymen and Audioslave, to call a number of — Mercer and Burton do not make hodgepodges of their very own pursuits. As a substitute, each Damaged Bells mission is an amalgamation of the duo’s unrelenting and far-ranging expertise, pinnacles of every artist’s most soulful pursuits that mesh in an virtually otherworldly method. And on their latest LP, INTO THE BLUE, 12 years after their first, Damaged Bells have reached an apex that’s vivid, cosmic and daring.
The story goes that Mercer and Burton met in 2004 at Roskilde Pageant in Denmark and have become quick associates, conserving in contact over the following few years, taking part in demos for one another and sporadically crossing paths on excursions. Earlier than Damaged Bells have been lastly assembled 4 years later, Mercer was engaged on the Shins’ third file Wincing the Night time Away, whereas Burton and CeeLo Inexperienced launched the Gnarls Barkley debut St. Elsewhere. “When [Mercer and I] met, I had actually simply began producing, making beats, that sort of factor,” Burton says. “I really listened to ‘An Simple Life’ the opposite day, and it was humorous how we went in, with out ever doing something collectively, and I feel we had a tune in a day, or two, in order that was a superb signal.”
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What makes Damaged Bells such an achievement for each Mercer and Burton is how the mission permits every songwriter to step out of their very own consolation zones. With the Shins, Mercer has lengthy been a staple in indie rock, and songs like “New Slang” and “Australia” have discovered long-lasting acclaim. Behind the boards, Burton broke out with The Gray Album, a masterpiece convergence of Jay-Z’s vocals from The Black Album and the instrumentals from the Beatles’ S/T (“The White Album”). However with Damaged Bells, and particularly on After the Disco and now INTO THE BLUE, the duo are exploring post-disco, funk, psychedelia and experimental pop to forge among the greatest electronica this facet of the millennium. Damaged Bells are, in some ways, an always-evolving continuation of The Gray Album: a convergence of Burton’s hip-hop compressions and Mercer’s grandiose, conventional melodicity, parts that, on the floor, really feel alien subsequent to one another however create magic when pooled collectively.
[Photo by Shervin Lainez and Nikki Fenix]
The eight years which have handed since After the Disco shouldn’t be categorized as a hiatus, as a result of that will suggest Mercer and Burton took a voluntary absence from the work. However in that hole, together with a pair of singles, “Shelter” and “Good Luck,” launched in 2018 and 2019, respectively, Mercer and Burton’s partnership didn’t pause. “We by no means actually stopped working,” Mercer says. “Each time we’d have time, and it appeared simple, we’d get collectively and simply proceed the method of trying to find cool concepts.” Within the time since After the Disco, Mercer put out the Shins’ file Heartworms, and Burton has labored on Adele’s 25, Purple Sizzling Chili Peppers’ The Getaway and Parquet Courts’ Broad Awake!, they usually’ve transitioned from Columbia Information to AWAL.
INTO THE BLUE was meant to reach a lot ahead of 2022. Although “Shelter” and “Good Luck” don’t seem on the ultimate lower of the album, Mercer and Burton assumed a full-length mission would naturally observe these singles. “I don’t suppose we all know once we’re getting in whether or not one thing goes to wind up being a standalone factor, or not,” Burton says. “[We’ve] by no means actually finished something in that method. I feel we didn’t need to be gone for thus lengthy.” Due to the pandemic, the 4 years with no new file shortly was six years after which seven and so forth. “I bear in mind considering that, if we acquired the album finished quickly sufficient, we might use ‘Shelter’ and ‘Good Luck’ on the file,” Mercer provides. “However time handed too shortly.”
With any good musical partnership, there’s a sure degree of belief at play. For Mercer and Burton, their friendship has vaulted them right into a dynamic that thrives off having confidence in one another’s pursuits and strategies. “For me, I belief [Burton’s] style,” Mercer says. “When he introduces one thing to me, I really feel like there’s one thing nice [there], and I simply should dig in and discover it. It makes it simpler to work laborious on one thing.” With Mercer dealing with the vocals and most of the preparations, he’s in a position to lean on Burton’s eager productional eye and work with him to assemble a ultimate form. “I feel, when one thing is outdoors of your self, it’s really easy to guage it than it’s when it’s one thing of your personal work,” Burton provides. “The way in which we work collectively, we don’t actually even should say a lot. We simply know, once we’re attempting stuff out, if the opposite individual’s into it or not.”
Half of Damaged Bells’ roots have all the time been dredged in hip-hop and R&B, however INTO THE BLUE is the primary bona fide launch that tinkers round with sampling in a frontal, methodical method. In 2015, Burton helped produce A$AP Rocky’s sophomore album, At. Lengthy. Final. ASAP, and key manufacturing components in that file’s basis framed Burton’s sonic mindset for Damaged Bells’ future. “I began working with samples once more, which I hadn’t finished in a very long time, with [A$AP] Rocky, and he acquired me again into sampling once more,” Burton says. “That simply so occurred to be at a time when [Mercer] and I began engaged on some stuff after After the Disco, after we toured and went again in and began performing some [new] songs, which was among the stuff that’s on this album.”
What INTO THE BLUE does higher than every other Damaged Bells mission, nonetheless, is yield an environment for Mercer’s dynamic spectrum of vocals. The progressions filling Burton’s headspace provide challenges to Mercer and ask him to widen, and, to no shock, he’s all the time as much as the duty. On songs like “We’re Not in Orbit But…” and “Love on the Run,” his cadence hurdles throughout a number of octaves, from the chamber-pop richness on the previous to a clean, soulful bravado on the latter. Even “Invisible Exit” wades into crooning, indie-folk waters backed by symphonic strings. Burton made certain that Mercer’s vocal monitoring was clear and spoke to the commanding presence it brings to any composition. “The most important factor that occurred that made it to [this album] was attempting to carve out more room, from place to put, for James’ voice, wanting to listen to his voice up entrance a bit extra,” Burton provides. “It’s occurred earlier than, however I feel it was a bit of bit deliberate, typically, on my half.”
Mercer’s aural skills have lengthy gleaned a tenor worthy of indie darlings, however it’s his Bee Gees-style falsetto, which flourished briefly on the Shins’ Port of Morrow and at full velocity on After the Disco which have elevated the potential of any Damaged Bells composition. “I feel I pushed myself to seek out new melodic selections and rhythmic issues which can be totally different from what I’ve finished with the Shins,” Mercer provides. “However there’s additionally pure inspiration that happens within the studio with [Burton].”
Lots of that inspiration builds off the duo’s unyielding belief in one another and Burton’s song-building roots in hip-hop, which he’s carried over into his work with different singers, however particularly Mercer. “The factor about hip-hop is, once I first began doing that, you make beats and you then play it for anyone they usually sit there and take heed to it time and again, they usually rap over it,” Burton provides. “And that’s how I work with vocalists. I’ve finished that with [Mercer], too. I’ll convey him one thing, and I’d by no means suppose to do what he winds up doing.”
The way in which the chapters of INTO THE BLUE got here collectively was natural. As Mercer places it, he and Burton get collectively and fiddle with devices till they discover one thing cool to run with. “After we would discover one thing, some chord development or no matter we appreciated, we’d file that after which simply loop it, start elaborating on it and constructing a tune that method,” Mercer provides. Burton’s sampling adjustments the dynamic, however practically all the pieces began from scratch within the studio.
Given how the pandemic postponed Mercer and Burton’s potential to complete INTO THE BLUE, the duo was in a position to preserve refining the songs they’d provide you with, versus “simply doing extra new songs,” as Burton places it. Having that availability and house was one thing they’d by no means encountered in such a palpable method earlier than, and it granted them the entry to make the tracklist the strongest one but.
Many modern musicians try to reintroduce older sounds into their very own sonic palettes. In flip, they cycle by way of a number of components that really feel extra like a pastiche than a linked sound with a single throughline. However for Damaged Bells, on INTO THE BLUE, the compositional variety and the preparations mesh superbly. On “Love on the Run,” specifically, the tune traverses a protracted plain that takes form as a piano ballad, funk dance quantity heavy on horns and a psychedelic guitar eruption. Mercer and Burton are in a position to revisit these moments in music historical past with out overselling something.
Whereas some artists take these retro sounds and attempt to play them authentically, Damaged Bells are doing the alternative, virtually as a result of they don’t have any different selection. “I can’t decide up an instrument and play very nicely. I can idiot round and get some pleased accidents and attempt to get an thought down, however I feel that, as a result of I’m not such a superb participant, I discovered a number of methods and shortcuts and issues that simply break it a bit of bit.” Burton says. “[The arrangements] usually are not so classically finished, however the love for the place the stuff comes from continues to be there, so it has that familiarity.”
The combination of latest and outdated that has come to outline a Damaged Bells album is the product of Mercer and Burton every occupying a distinct a part of the duo’s repertoire. Mercer is a well-versed multi-instrumentalist, whereas Burton can shoulder a monitor to the end line like few others. “I feel the damaged factor to issues, the restricted skills of myself and James, who can play very well and sing very well, [when] you combine them collectively, simply has one thing a bit of totally different to it,” Burton provides.
It’s uncommon to see a pair of associates, each of whom are sometimes doing different issues, like elevating youngsters or racking up Grammy nominations, so generously return to one another as if no time has handed. INTO THE BLUE sounds nothing just like the Shins’ Oh, Inverted World or Gorillaz’s Demon Days or the Black Keys’ El Camino, and that’s wholly the purpose. The issues Mercer and Burton get stoked on, just like the Beatles and the Elephant 6 collective, usually overlap. You possibly can see the stems of the duo’s different work poking by way of on INTO THE BLUE, however what shines most is how every of their passions and pursuits get translated so uniquely into the well-oiled, undeniably groovy machine that’s Damaged Bells.
“Even when we each love one thing, we each love one thing utterly totally different about it,” Burton says. “I is likely to be listening to it utterly otherwise than he’s listening to it, however we do sufficient of it the place it really works.” What’s going to come subsequent for Mercer and Burton hasn’t been written but, however INTO THE BLUE is a stark reminder that typically our greatest work arises once we’ve acquired somebody we belief to lean on.
