Arts
January 28
Hugh Grant, who I hate, made a career out of playing the same person, each one as sniveling, perpetually flummoxed and charming as the last. However, as he so accurately shows in "Gran Torino" (2009), Clint Eastwood — whose coolness has inspired me to name my first three children Clint, East and Wood, regardless of their genders — has made an even more successful career out of arguably even less variation. Harry Callahan, William Munny and Walt Kowalski all have the same skills and the same flaws and shamelessly kill similar amounts of people. The only way to tell them apart is to measure the relative elasticity of the character's skin — if flesh clings to his bones, then its Callahan, if it doesn't, its Kowalski, and if it kind-of does, its Munny. And yet, if I could "Talented-Mr.-Ripley" anybody over the age of 65, it would no doubt be Eastwood.
Is my disparity in preference hypocritical? Should my hate for Hugh Grant and his one dimension apply to the equally limited Clint Eastwood? No, and here's why: Clint Eastwood's characters are really cool, and Hugh Grant's characters are really lame.
Enter Department of Eagles, technically a "side project" duo featuring Grizzly Bear songwriter, guitarist and vocalist Daniel Rossen, but more accurately a smaller, leaner version of Grizzly Bear. While some musicians start side projects to explore musical interests that their primary group ignores, Rossen (and non-Bear Fred Nicolaus) uses DoE to explore vocal harmonies, guitar tones and phrases and ambiance roughly identical to those he and his bandmates mastered on Grizzly Bear's instant-classic 2006 release "Yellow House." Do I hold my nose high, spitting on Rossen for his unwillingness to expand his horizons or challenge himself to do something new?
Hell no. In fact, I shell out way too much money to see him do his thing live. DoE may sound a lot like Grizzly Bear, but Grizzly Bear's music — especially Rossen's contribution to it — is so intelligent, so arrestingly pretty and so like everything I want to hear from an indie rock band that, in the absence of any new Grizzly Bear records, I will gladly take Rossen doing Grizzly Bear Lite, which is essentially what the DoE show at the Brattle Theater was.
"Around the Bay," built around delicate guitar fingerpicks and Rossen's cherubim soprano, for example, sounded like a less haunting version of "Yellow House" standout "Little Brother," only without the orchestra of backing instruments. You didn't have to squint to see the similarities in mood and instrumentation between the intro of "House" song "On a Neck, on a Spit" and whimsical DoE tune "Floating on the Lehigh," which feels and sounds like a pared down version of the Grizzly Bear song. And "Balmy Night," the last song on DoE's 2007 release "In Ear Park," essentially digests "Little Brother," "Easier," and "Reprise" into a thinner, less moving version of "Yellow House," which, to me, is both logical and laudable for someone who played a central role in arranging that record.
Not only should we expect the same musical vision with which Rossen imbues "Yellow House" to figure into his non-Bear songwriting, but for him to be able to even come close to replicating the uniquely ephemeral atmosphere of that record is a genuine achievement.
The only disappointment was how unfunny Nicolaus and Rossen were. I expected hilarious banter from the guys who named an EP "Noam Chomsky Spring Break" (2003), but their painfully awkward exchanges left me unsatisfied. But while their comedic prowess didn't live up to my predictions, their music definitely did. Yes, DoE sounds a lot like Grizzly Bear, but as far as I'm concerned, sounding like a band that A) you're in and B) is awesome is far from an assailable creative choice.
