As long as I live
Bruce Peninsula’s new record represents a new lease on life, literally, even if it wasn’t entirely intentional.
The “alt-choral” group has returned with its second full-length album, but it wasn’t easy to come by. The group, helmed by lead singer Neil Haverty, made a concerted effort in mid-2010 to work up a group of songs that added more detailed musical elements to their unmistakable sound. According to press materials and interviews, the group wrote quickly, embracing its instincts and not over-working the songs. Open Flames, the result of those sessions, was originally ready to go for spring of this year. But Haverty was diagnosed with a form of leukemia in December and the record was put on hold while he received treatment. When the leukemia went into remission Haverty emerged from potential tragedy armed with a newly-assembled group of singers and released the album.
While there’s nothing in the press materials that indicates Haverty was aware of or anticipating any kind of medical distress the lyrics of Open Flames certainly reflect the undeniable fragility of life. The group’s first record was sprinkled with apocalyptic lyrical tableaus, Haverty’s words portraying mountains as mouths eating the sky and bodies of water actively working to overwhelm the land. The implication of inevitable decay is here in spades once again, but turned inward. “As Long As I Live” starts the album as a bold statement; the thunderingly percussive track is as mighty a musical arrangement as Haverty has produced. His gruff singing tells the story of an overgrown, crumbling earth calling his name. He admits that, “my hand was a hammer and my heart was a stone…my heavy heart now a phantom limb for as long as I live.” A primarily-female choral vocal persists throughout the song’s remainder, insisting, “You can’t hide what you are.”
The troubled sentiment persists, through the next song and beyond. “What am I if not just dust?” he wonders during “In Your Light,” a song whose bright, polyrhythmic guitar figures and convoluted bass line betray the underlying worry of that question. “Pull Me Under” is an obvious one, as Haverty laments, “I can’t keep my head above the water.” “Say Yeah” sees Haverty’s voice return after several numbers carried by female singers. He sounds wearier and more drawn than before as he sings, “What has come to collect you soon will come to protect you.” He sounds more than ever like he needs that protection. “Open Flame” is a cry for purification, a plea for something to burn away the darkness, “if only your body can stand for you.” “Cliffs and Coves” reflects the earthly imagery of the first album, imploring “Oh mountain, resist,” even as the waves of a great body of water unyieldingly slam against its base, slowly eroding that which makes it whole (a more apt cancer metaphor I have yet to find). The album ends with “Chupacabra,” in which Haverty concedes, “I don’t know where my body goes.”
It’s an overarching tenor that would seem prescient if the music hadn’t come before the illness. The idea of a heart as a phantom limb (a syndrome where someone who has lost an arm or leg feels in their mind that the limb is still there) is, in particular, an incredible metaphor, suggesting a kind of impossible loneliness or isolation. Still, Haverty and The Bruce Peninsula aren’t overcome by the dour nature of some of their words. The defining elements of their music ensure that simply cannot happen.
For the uninitiated, their music is generally constructed around a varying degree of minimalist folk and/or rock instrumentation, but impeccably-layered vocal arrangements and a big-tent, choral atmosphere give them a unique kind of immensity that pushes each song into it’s own brand of maximalism. Think of the arrangements of a band like Explosions In The Sky but instead of the consistent, building intensity being generated by the instruments an ever-swelling tsunami of human voices layered and piled on top of one another is responsible for creating the dramatic peaks and valleys. To a person, every voice you’ll hear on this record is imbued with a remarkable kind of passion, their tenor and tone conveying the emotional edge of the song one syllable at a time. Haverty’s sandpapery lead vocals serve as counterpoint to the inevitable tenor of polish a choral arrangement demands, lending an incredible character to each number.
Haverty also knows when to give up the reigns. His new choir, which has been in the past as high as ten people during live performances (one imagines there’s no cap on that number when they’re working in the studio), is anchored by strong female vocalists like Daniela Gesundheit (better known as Snowblink) and Tamara Lindeman, whose own “band” The Weather Station is gaining a lot of steam right now. Haverty surrenders or shares the lead with these powerful, expressive singers on most of the record’s middle half; the fantastically-constructed “Say Yeah” sees them harmonizing throughout. The song’s dynamic melodicism benefits not only from their performances but also a series of rhythmic shifts that run counter to the preciousness of the verses. It’s something altogether new for Bruce Peninsula, the vulnerability of those verses betraying the electric guitar and pounding drums that finish out the song in a punishing fashion.
It’s those signs of growth that help Open Flames succeed. It’s the inherent power of Haverty’s lyricism, the unequivocal feeling and passion in the singing that is the defining characteristic of the band, and the unique approach to rock music that continues to allow it to stand alone in it’s own corner of the music world. It’s an undeniably powerful record that never seems repetitive, routine, or rehashed.
But Open Flames is not an album about death; that would be too simple. It’s an album about life, about honesty, about embracing that which makes us human. Even with a dark cloud hanging overhead it’s about as joyous a cautionary tale as you’ll ever hear and it’s a stand-out record in a year that threatens to overflow with them.
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