We Could Finally Be Done

The New Pornographers @ Hammerstein Ballroom 11/17/2014
Brill Bruisers / Myriad Harbour / Moves / War on the East Coast / Sing Me Spanish Techno / Crash Years / All the Old Showstoppers / Jackie, Dressed In Cobras / Another Drug Deal of the Heart / The Laws Have Changed / You Tell Me Where / Testament to Youth in Verse / Wide Eyes / Marching Orders / Adventures in Solitude / Jackie / Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk / Backstairs / Silver Jenny Dollar / Champions of Red Wine / Born with a Sound / Mass Romantic // Challengers / Dancehall Domine / The Bleeding Heart Show /// Use It / Slow Descent Into Alcoholism

This was an excellent show but I don’t really have anything to say about it other than that I have seen The New Pornographers many times since 2001, and their always-strong harmony game has reached a new level. The pure vocal power in this show was impressive, enough to feel like a big punch in the set’s most bombastic songs. They are incredible, and you should go see them.

The New Pornographers “You Tell Me Where”

Carl Newman’s lyrics have always walked a thin line between crypticism and open emotion, so in most of his songs you can get a good sense of his sentiment even if some lines, however evocative, are mystifying in their specificity. You definitely get that in “You Tell Me Where,” the grand finale of Brill Bruisers, and one of the most impressive songs the New Pornographers have ever made. To a large extent the power of the song is due to its vocal arrangement, which alternates the lead between Newman, Neko Case, and Kathryn Calder before ending with a full-on choral blast at the climax. The lyrics address some sort of falling out, and each of the singers convey a different sentiment – Newman’s parts are bitter and passive-aggressive, Neko is melancholy, and Calder is chilly but diplomatic. It’s Calder’s part that gets under my skin, and reminds me too much of bad emotional situations I’ve been in, where the idea of compromising yourself to please someone else seems like a more valid option than making an effort to have anything you actually want. But there’s a twist in here, where the acquiescent tone shifts to sarcasm, and the big climax – “I think I could change and become what you want me / to think, we could finally be done” – only reads as defiant. It’s a big “fuck you” of a song, and ends the record on this huge feeling of catharsis and relief.

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