The Besnard Lakes: The Besnard Lakes Are the Roaring Night

The Besnard Lakes are getting a raw deal from this review.  How am I supposed to appreciate an album so sprawling in a scant couple of weeks?  I was up and down on each song, each layer, each voice.  One night, I was ready to quit listening to certain songs, other nights I was hitting repeat on my “least favorites.”  I feel like I need another week to really dig in. Then again, I don’t want to listen to it for at least a month.

Having said that, the album holds my attention.  And it is really well produced.  The noisy intro track “Like the Ocean Like the Innocent, Part One” leads delicately into part two of the same title.  And the vocals take over from there.  Jace Lasek’s high-pitched caterwauling is drawn-out and beautiful much like the song itself.  As he and Olga Goreas back-and-forth their way through the echoing choruses ” You’re like the ocean./ You’re like the innocent./ What’s in your empty eyes?” the repetition is heavy and slow.  But the listener does not slog through without a bridge to backing lyrics “Take it off/ Take this noose around my neck,/ take it off.” As the vocals drop out, a guitar solo leads to the finish of the two-part epic.

Then Lasek takes over again.  His falsetto rings over the first 2:30 of “Last Train to Chicago” with a simple, textural melody underneath him.  The song doesn’t exactly detonate, but it rollicks along to a nice finale– the initial melody working into their layers with minimal effort.  Goreas gets her chance to lead in “Albatross,” the albums most dynamic song (and the single to boot).  Her even-handed vocal style is a stark contrast to Lasek.  The band’s sense of melody is on full display here– horns and bursting bass lines create a sense of importance as Goreas delivers her aural simplicity: “And I scream for you/ There goes my man.”  She delivers the final line several times in a deadpan manner– no holding notes or changing things up, just an easygoing mantra-like precision as the instruments expand behind her.

The biggest strength of The Besnard Lakes, as seen above and in my favorite track “Glass Printer,” is the calmness in the face of big, garbled sounds– the vocalists are merely there to further the ethos.  There is no need to show off– even in falsetto-dominant songs– since the vocals are really just another instrument.  Regressing the point, however, are the monochromatic swells of spaghetti western guitars in “Land of the Living Skies Part 2: The Skies.”  The Besnard Lakes Are the Roaring Night hits an apex it cannot possibly contain in another epic two-parter.  There’s too much going on and not enough.  The beautiful keyboard overshadows the lyrics.  The guitars swell and fade.  Yet, nothing makes sense.  Honestly, I was amazed and horrified as the song forged ahead, vocals  overdubbed as the troops descend to their knees (lyrically) and the solos begin and it’s all happening.  The biggest strength concedes to the weakness of more.  And it continues in “And This is What We Call Progress.”  Everything is perfectly placed, but there’s no relenting to needed simplicity.  It’s all so epic that they lose their strengths in the din of expansion.  They sound like the American 1800s they inhabit in their songs.

The album winds down on the last two songs.  “Light Up the Night” and “The Lonely Moan” round out what feels like an excellent and dynamic album.  Somehow, though the songs seem like the welcomed end of a battle.  They are both wonderfully epic, like so much of Roaring Night.  They are so dreadfully epic like so much of Roaring Night.  I enjoy each and every song on this record so long as I am given a break after every three.  After being barraged for nearly 45 minutes, the ears and brain seek respite.  This record is brilliant and burning like a bonfire, but after awhile, I am tired of inhaling smoke and heat.  As much as I love the invention of fire, my ears crave the silencing of it’s crackle.  “The Lonely Moan” provides it, sure, but a touch too late.

Again, I feel apologetic.  This album is well-constructed, well-maintained and brilliant.  It’s just too much of a good thing. I’d recommend this record to anyone, but I’m happy to bury it for awhile. I’m sure its rediscovery will come with a fresher perspective and a clearer head. Until then, I hope the Besnard Lakes will accept my humble apologies.  They got shorted on this one.