Something About Airplanes (1998)

Like a lot of debut albums from Nineties indie legends revisited years later, Something About Airplanes is an encouraging and surprisingly fully-formed first step, but, in retrospect, more useful as a signpost for the future. In 2018, it now scans as a blueprint for Death Cab For Cutie’s long ascent into the mainstream via critical adoration. What’s striking about their debut two decades later is, notwithstanding how subtly innovative it sounds compared to the Pacific North-Western template that characterised much indie from where DCFC hailed, is how effective Gibbard and Walla’s compositional skills and eyes for detail are in places.

Something About Airplanes is populated with an unusually large number of slower, more pensive tracks, as average indie debuts go. The bittersweet harmonies of ‘Pictures In An Exhibition’, the pointed slowcore of ‘Sleep Spent’, and the layered guitar lines of ‘Your Bruise’ are all excellent moments. There’s something a little lightweight and undercooked about a handful of tracks, such as the slight, orchestrated opener ‘Bend To Squares’, but these would be ironed out quickly in future DCFC releases. The sample-heavy ‘President Of What?’ also sounds very of its time. Signs of Gibbard’s wordsmithery are evident in puns like “he’s unresponsive ‘cos you’re irresponsible” (‘Amputations’), but for the most part, given Death Cab For Cutie’s representation for often earnest emoting, he was quite cryptic here, making Something About Airplanes a worthwhile album to revisit and scan for clues.

Essentially, Something About Airplanes sounds like the product of its environment – it could only have been by a small band from liberal Washington college town. Its sometimes sketch-like, fledgling nature means it’s treasured by diehards (something brought out in Barsuk’s 10^th anniversary re-issue) but it is best understood as a first step towards great things. You can trace a straight line from every aspect of DCFC’s subsequent output back to some element in Something About Airplanes. (7/10) (LISTEN)

We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes (2000)

Putting a bit more flesh on the bones of the ideas they set out in Something About Airplanes, DCFC’s second album feels like a much more effective mission statement for their career than their debut. Ben Gibbard’s songwriting sparkled consistently for the first time, and the group properly carved out the despondent indie-pop niche that they’ve long since defined. His lyrics were more pointed and nuanced, and his bandmates seemed to play with greater purpose, striking up sturdy hooks and powerful dirges, making We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes one of the most fondly remembered American indie albums of its time and place.

DCFC’s musicianship provides a fitting backdrop for Gibbard’s precise but densely descriptive writing with delicate arpeggios, ringing chords, and non-obvious atmosphere building. Sweetness and bitterness mix in lyrics like “This won’t be the last you hear from me, it’s just the start / I hope that he keeps you up for weeks, like you did to me” (‘For What Reason’). His plaintive voice does the emotional heavy-lifting on quick, clipped but shimmering indie moments like ‘Lowell, MA’ and ‘Company Calls’. A great example is mid-album gem ‘Little Fury Bugs’, that’s reminiscent of the darker end of the grunge spectrum, but is cut through by his voice for lighter relief. Tracks like ‘The Employment Pages’ and ‘No Joy In Mudville’ are a noticeable improvement on the morose moments from their debut, and the latter provides the first of an expansive brace of tracks to close a diverse and expressive album.

For many, We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes is the definitive Death Cab For Cutie statement. It seems innocuous and understated at first, particularly to newcomers familiar with the kind of frank, emotional show-and-tell that Gibbard and his bandmates deal in, but suddenly, when you’re not particularly paying attention, a lyric will get under your skin, snag you and hook you in. It’s certainly stood the test of time, both as a period piece and as a work that’s still emotionally resonant today. (8/10) (LISTEN)

The Photo Album (2001)

A worthy and accessible follow-up to a cult indie classic, Death Cab For Cutie’s third record placed a greater emphasis on beauty and simplicity, and signalled the beginning of the band’s tilt into the mainstream along with the glittering Forbidden Love EP 12 months before. While he only appeared on this solitary Death Cab For Cutie album, the group’s second drummer Michael Schorr locks in seamlessly with bassist Nick Harmer, while Gibbard and Walla’s craftsmanship takes on a slightly bigger, more professional and cinematic edge.

The overarching theme of The Photo Album is explicitly is about love – either lost, or never gained. The bed-headed plaintiveness of ‘A Movie Script Ending’ perfectly sets up Gibbard’s aesthetic here, as he renders at least one vivid image in every track here. Basically, it’s emo before it meant My Chemical Romance. ‘Steadier Footing’ evokes the feelings of every painful shy would-be romantic guy, ruing his hesitance with “And this is the chance I never got / To make a move, but we just talk”. The lyrics to ‘Styrofoam Plates’ sees the narrator admonish an absent father who’s left his family in poverty; ‘Why You’d Want To Live Here’ is a perfect take-down of L.A. life. (“you can’t swim in a town this shallow”). There’s lighter moments amid the confessional outpourings, however, such as the reserved power-pop of ‘I Was A Kaleidoscope’.

Arguably even more than its predecessor, The Photo Album showcases Gibbard’s ability to cut to the heart of the matter, through bullshit and platitudes, and makes for possibly the most immediately accessible of all nine Death Cab For Cutie albums, as well as one of the most emotionally honest. (8/10) (LISTEN)

Transatlanticism (2003)

Gibbard’s fifth album in six years (counting his work with The Postal Service’s excellent Give Up, also in 2003) saw a significant upturn in Death Cab For Cutie’s fortunes, with a large number of new fans climbing aboard with Transatlanticism, their first record to crack the Billboard Top 200 and one that was harder and more focussed and mature than anything they had delivered before.

The melodrama of arena-rock opener ‘The New Year’ immediately sets the tone for Transatlanticism’s new-found sense of sonic ambition: reflected in the fully-fledged anthem of ‘We Looked Like Giants’ and the brisk ‘The Sound Of Settling’, the latter of which features some equally melodramatic musings on ageing (“Our youth is fleeting / old age is just around the bend and I can’t wait to go gray”). On ‘Title And Registration’, Gibbard’s lyrics are truly revelatory, following the logic of human thought processes as one tiny detail prompts a person to think about something entirely different – in this case, Gibbard pining for his ex ends up with him wondering why the glove compartment is called that when people don’t store gloves in them.

The second side of Transatlanticism slows the pace down dramatically, and this is where the album really earns its reputation. ‘Tiny Vessels’ is a downbeat treat, while the epic expanses of the title track make for an all-time DCFC highlight. The finely picked closer ‘A Lack Of Color’ also saw them go full-on acoustic and make it work without being overly earnest.

Their fourth album remains a bench mark for Death Cab For Cutie; and it’s the now-settle group’s maturity as musicians, as well as the full blooming of Gibbard’s signature introspection, that make Transatlanticism such a compelling listen from start to finish. As well as an artistic triumph, it marked the start of a new era for Death Cab For Cutie, as the word-of-mouth success, coupled with that of The Postal Service and a handful of DCFC songs being included on hit TV shows like ‘The O.C.’ and ‘Six Feet Under’, led major label Atlantic to snap them up the following year. (8/10) (LISTEN)

Plans (2005)

Death Cab For Cutie’s leap into the majors brought about significant changes in the way the band worked. For starters, it was their first record not to be made in their Pacific North-Western home – instead, Atlantic dispatched DCFC to a rural farmhouse in Massachusetts, a place that Gibbard described as “virtually in the middle of nowhere” and the sort of place “a label sends a band if the singer’s a junkie and they need to get him away from the bad things in the city”. Taking their time about their next statement, recording was comparatively slow given the rapid turnaround of its independently released predecessors.

“One of my favourite kind of dark jokes is, ‘How do you make God laugh? You make a plan’,” Gibbard explained about the album, which was kind of a fatalistic attitude considering where his talent had led him in under a decade. But perhaps some of that carried over into the album itself, as Plans sharply divided the critics when it was released.

It felt like a complete and logical sequel to Transatlanticism to some, with Death Cab For Cutie making the transition to the big leagues faultlessly, but others thought the power-pop leanings in Plans were over-produced to the detriment of Gibbard’s songwriting. The truth is somewhere in the middle. Certainly, many moments are more polished and posed than previous DCFC efforts, a consequence of major label muscle, and this does sometimes throw the wrong kind of light onto Gibbard’s lyrics. For the most part, Death Cab For Cutie retain the same kind of measured restraint that characterised previous efforts, and the only real criticism is that Plans is arguably the first album that doesn’t advance Death Cab For Cutie’s artistry in any way, instead representing a ‘firm hand on the tiller’.

What’s also undeniable is that Plans does house a couple of all-time Death Cab For Cutie highlights, most notably the Grammy-winning single ‘I Will Follow You Into The Dark’. The mellow yet skyscraping ‘Marching Bands Of Manhattan’ and the shuffling, brooding ‘Different Names For The Same Thing’ presage The National, while the muted jangle-pop of ‘Soul Meets Body’ is also a terrific single. But although the first half is strong, it does tail off noticeably as it goes on, suffering from uniformity. For all this, some fans staunchly defend Plans as their most complete statement. While we disagree, it’s certainly up there as their most professional. (6/10) (LISTEN)

Narrow Stairs (2008)

Entering the second decade, Death Cab For Cutie commenced the second phase of their career with a curious sixth album. Narrow Stairs seemed to offer a number of different versions of what the band could be, a multitude of paths to choose to take and futures to explore. It has something of a mixtape feel, and while this makes for a diverse experience, it’s also an uneven one.

Gibbard himself reflected on the creative process behind Narrow Stairs three years later, and suggested that it’s his most emotionally raw and dark work – possibly subsequently matched by his post-break-up album Kintsugi in 2015 – while Chris Walla said that he was hands-off as a producer, wanting to keep things impromptu and improvised in the studio.

The West Coast feel of ‘Bixby Canyon Bridge’ can’t hide the sense of unease that surrounds Narrow Stairs’ best moments, channelling that darkness that Gibbard was feeling – that vague sense that, as you get older, you realise contentment might always be elusive despite the trappings of success. ‘I Will Possess Your Heart’ is a swirling and hypnotic emo-indie epic cut through with a haunting piano figure, with Gibbard’s vocals arriving nearly five minutes into the song. The lithe, nimble ‘Long Division’ is also excellent, as are the power-pop heartbreaker ‘Cath…’ and the sparse ‘Pity And Fear’. More average moments, however, ultimately hinder the record’s development of a personality of its own, such as the ballast of ‘Grapevine Fires’ and the slightly phoned-in Sixties pop of ‘You Can Do Better Than Me’.

While it’s entertaining to revisit and decipher a decade on, Narrow Stairs feels like a bit of a garbled message, an attempt at market re-positioning that doesn’t quite have its intended effect. That didn’t stop it from topping the Billboard Top 200, representing the apex of a triumphant ascent from college-rock faves to mainstream stars. It also provided the foundations that have sustained Death Cab For Cutie with continued success for the last decade. (6/10) (LISTEN)

Codes And Keys (2011)

Recorded in eight different studios with sessions never longer than a fortnight at a time, Death Cab For Cutie continued with their policy of self-enforced change to keep themselves moving forward as the 2010s commenced. Walla brought in an outsider to help with mixing a DCFC album for the first time in the shape of the esteemed Alan Moulder, who gives Codes And Keys a fresh power and clarity.

Some die-hard fans found it hard to digest, arguing that it leant too much towards the contemporary indie-rock anthemics of other bands instead of the textural qualities they loved so much about DCFC and rendered it disinterested, while others felt that Gibbard’s lyrics sparkled with less lustre and insight than before. However, though it does suffer from being generic in a few places, Codes And Keys is a very handy entry point to Death Cab For Cutie’s catalogue, showcasing at least every facet of their appeal in the same kind of way as the very accessible The Photo Album did a decade previously.

Perhaps that’s because of Gibbard’s newly-found marital bliss that temporarily banishes the hyper-literate gloominess for which the band is famed. Confidence and contentment breathes through many tracks, with lyrics like “We’ll live in slow motion and be free / with doors unlocked and open”. The skittering rhythms of opener ‘Home Is A Fire’ underpin a blissful experience, and comes close to recalling Gibbard’s work with The Postal Service in the mood it conjures. Mid-Nineties Yo La Tengo is channelled in the low-key ‘St. Peter’s Cathedral’, while excellent lead single ‘You Are A Tourist’ topped three of America’s alternative/rock charts.

While the indie-rock riffs are dialled back in favour of fashionable Eno-esque productions, making for arguably the biggest outlier in Death Cab For Cutie’s discography, Codes And Keys is a quiet triumph when given patience and taken on its own terms. (7/10) (LISTEN)

Kintsugi (2015)

Composed in the aftermath of Gibbard’s divorce from actress Zooey Deschanel, Kintsugi appropriately takes its title from the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery. But arguably the more crucial separation that informs Death Cab For Cutie’s eighth album is the departure of guitarist and ever-present producer Chris Walla halfway through its recording, depriving Gibbard of a reliable creative foil upon whom he had depended for nearly two decades. All of a sudden, Death Cab For Cutie were veterans instead of gonna-be’s, and now had a fight on their hands to retain their indie-pop crown.

It’s to Gibbard and the band’s enormous credit that Kintsugi manages to be the most coherent DCFC release of the last decade, when logic would suggest otherwise. The production is dense and lush, and the latent electronic tendencies that Gibbard had been toying with since Narrow Stairs mesh a lot more effectively with the Death Cab For Cutie indie-rock template than before. “I don’t know why I return to the scenes of these crimes”, he sings on ‘The Ghosts Of Beverly Drive’, a track heavily influenced by ‘80s pop with its gated drums. The mellow ‘You’ve Haunted Me All My Life’, the latter-day Strokes feel of ‘Good Help (Is So Hard To Find)’, and the clap-along 2010s arena indie of ‘Everything’s A Ceiling’ are terrific highlights. He directly addresses his split with Deschanel in opener ‘No Room In Frame’, with lyrics referencing separation and celebrity (“was I in your way when the cameras turned to face you / no room in frame for two”).

The only downside to Kintsugi is that, song for song, it’s far from their best, with just one too many songs scanning as filler, and it unbalances the great moments that remind the listener of DCFC’s emotional power. The cornball piano-led closer ‘Binary Sea’ could have come from any landfill indie album of the previous decade; ‘El Dorado’ and ‘Ingenue’ are both quite featureless; while the drivetime rock aesthetics powering ‘Little Wanderer’ are surely below a writer of Gibbard’s calibre.

While it wasn’t one of Gibbard’s or Death Cab For Cutie’s absolute prime albums, Kintsugi was a valuable and worthwhile exercise in so far that has offered a renewed sense of identity to a well-established group going forwards. Many bands in their situation do not display such willingness to play around with their formula. (6/10) (LISTEN)

Thank You For Today (2018)

As yet another relationship in Benjamin Gibbard’s life dissolved, with Chris Walla now officially having left and altered the dynamics of Death Cab For Cutie forever, the band choose to look forward and embrace their future on Thank You For Today, opting for a little bit more of a synth-heavy approach. As with many other recent Death Cab For Cutie efforts, however, it only realises its newer ambitions some of the time, falling back into examples of the tried and tested.

Straightforward and descriptive as ever, Gibbard’s lyrics still fit perfectly for a disproportionately melancholic rainy autumn evening, as the music skirts the borders of pop appeal. But while songs like the wistful ‘Summer Years’, with its simplistic yet lush arrangement and production, and the closer ‘60 & Punk’, which reaches the curious coupling of insightfulness and genuine emotional investment Alex Turner recently only wished for, display the creative niche Death Cab For Cutie are still very much capable of occupying and towering over, there are other moments like ‘Near/Far’ that can only be described as mediocre.

The sad indie appeal that Death Cab For Cutie have mastered over two decades is what keeps the album from being a horrible swerve to the left, and there’s the occasional hint of forwards momentum, but as of now, Thank You For Today’s descriptors stand as ‘lovely’, ‘serviceable’ and yet ‘unremarkable’. (6/10) (LISTEN)