Dead Letter Chorus

 

the bell talks to Gabrielle Huber from Dead Letter Chorus about the band's new album, Yearlings. 

“You’re washing it away from yourself but you’re making it art as well.”

These songs are as well formed as the scenes they construct. It’s almost as if Yearlings takes on different lives, in some ways it’s as comforting as gran’s apple tea cake and in others as tense as a tightly wound string.

It comes as no surprise that the tracks spin the delicate story of two lovers – where else but in relationships are these extremes of emotion found. As the band’s female lead Gabrielle Huber lets in,

“Our songwriting tends to be a lot about relationships, I guess they’re the most intense part of our lives where we feel emotions in their raw form.”

Is it difficult to translate these experiences into song?

“It’s definitely a cathartic process. I’m an emotional person and sometimes I find these emotions hard to deal with but when you can put it in a song and perform it to people… you’re washing it away from yourself but you’re making it art as well.”

It seems that the word artwork encapsulates my feelings towards Yearlings.

It’s as if each song takes me to another time and place sometimes near, often faraway. It’s difficult to describe but take a listen to tracks like Yellow House and Covered by Snow and you’ll see what I mean, 

As the stories begin where others left off you could easily mistake that each track was written with another in mind, although this wasn’t the case…

“We wrote them all as individual entities, unrelated to another… when it came to the track listing we realized that there was a pattern going on, we put them in order and it took the course of the ups and downs of a relationship, a beginning and an ending. We thought that would be a nice narrative to the album, to take you on a little bit of a journey.”

This is a band whose friendships are as comfortable and well worn as the steps leading to their Yellow House. It takes likeminded people to make likeminded music and Dead Letter Chorus is no exemption,

“I have such a clear idea of how I want the songs to sound, when you give it to the members of your band you’ve got to trust them and know they’ll interpret it in a way that’s good for the song. It’s a comfort to know that you trust one another and you have control over the songs because it’s like a family.”

With all this said, I’m still a little curious - what does Yearlings mean? And what’s behind those horses on the cover?

“It was something about horses being regal creatures and Yearlings means a one year old horse. It took us a year to do the album so it was really fitting.

We wrote the songs a couple of weeks leading up to our first Canadian tour and we wrote the rest of them throughout the tour. It was a really quick process, the songs came organically.” 

2010 was certainly a year to remember as Dead Letter Chorus not only penned these songs, but also produced them with the assistance of Les Cooper.

“We’ve always self produced and we really wanted to take someone else on board, like a six member of the band… we really noticed the difference to have that extra element, a fresh set of ears coming in was important in how the album came to fruition.”

After minutes spent attempting to write this final sentence, the one that captures the album as a whole and entices everyone to have a listen, I can’t seem to remove one thought from my mind.

In all seriousness, Yearlings is like a wonderful assortment of jellybeans – there’s something to please everyone. 

 Drop in to JB Hi Fi for a copy of Yearlings, or any other reliable music store. Also feel free to check it out on Itunes.