Canadians are so generous with their universal health care, chill pot laws, musician grants and free EPs with the pre-order of an album.
Broken Social Scene's Charles Spearin explains it best, so we'll let him be a guest contributor today:
I know that some bands write their songs, rehearse them and then
record them. Not Broken Social Scene. In recording Forgiveness Rock
Record we did it our usual way: swimming in chaos and making it up as we
go along. We started by loosely sketching out 30 songs in my garage,
driving to Chicago, recording 20 of those, and then writing 20 more.
The point was to never stop working. Whenever we got exhausted or
overwhelmed we would take a breath, pick up our instruments and jam
purely ‘for spirit purposes’. It was musical-therapy of sorts. Part of
what kept the ideas flowing was Soma’s smaller, second studio where we
could test out new ideas and experiment with overdubs. While John
worked in the main room, this B-Room quickly became our musical kitchen
where we cooked up soups of sound without the pressures time and money.One evening, as a kind of exercise in spontaneity,
Kevin, Brendan and I each took turns writing and recording minute-long
“songs” with minimal overdubs just to see what would happen. We kept
saying to John “we’re making you an EP!” It was a sort of
first-thought-best-thought approach to music making. Within a few hours
we had six lovely little soundscapes, one of which ended up being the
closing song on Forgiveness Rock Record, ‘Me & My Hand’, and the
rest became the beginnings of Lo-Fi For The Dividing Nights.As we continued to work on Forgiveness the B-room became more and more
important as both a musical and social outlet – there are a lot of us in
Broken Social Scene and it’s hard for us to sit on our hands – so
naturally Ohad, Sam and Sebastian each recorded a song in the same
spontaneous way. ‘Song For Dee’, the only traditional “song” on Lo-Fi
For The Dividing Nights, Brendan, Kevin and I recorded when we found out
that our good friend Wayne’s dog died and we wanted to cheer him up.All of the songs on Lo-Fi For The Dividing Nights were recorded in
Soma’s B-Room while Forgiveness Rock Record was being made. What these
songs have in common is that they were all written in a spirit of
playfulness and fearlessness where we could throw our discrimination to
the wind and let the judges and critics take the night off. This tiny
B-Room sanctuary fomented a very positive frame of mind, ultimately
leading to one of the most enjoyable album-making experiences we’ve ever
had. We hope you enjoy listening to these songs as much as we enjoyed
recording them.
To receive Lo-Fi for the Dividing Night become a member of the Broken Social Scene fan club and pre-order Forgiveness Rock Record from Gallery AC.
NPR is currently streaming Forgiveness Rock Record, so you don't have to be squeamish about your investment.
