The Special Edition is no longer special. These days it’s easy to feel skeptical about words like “deluxe,” “expanded,” “rebooted,” or any other focus-grouped synonym—particularly when they’re attached to the name of a record you could have sworn came out a few months ago. Blame the ever-accelerating nostalgia cycle, the desperate marketing tactics of a wheezing industry, or the everyone-on-the-team-gets-a-trophy mentality of our youth; probably just blame all three. But whatever the reason, we’ve gotten to a place where albums have Frankensteinian titles like Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded - The Re-Up, and the extra, wait-wait-there’s-more material on these revamps often feels obligatory, forced, and better off back in the vault.
Leave it to Grizzly Bear, though, to be an exception to the rule. The Brooklyn-based craftsmen of sepia-toned chamber pop have a history of putting out non-album releases that are much better and more meticulously arranged than they need to be. Take, for example, their 2007 Friend EP: Judging from the tracklist, it might have seemed like an “expanded” version of the previous year’s breakthrough Yellow House. Friend featured alternate takes of old songs, a few covers (some by the band themselves and some by contemporaries like Band of Horses and CSS), and a self-recorded demo. But when you listened, it was clear that this was much more than some half-assed stop-gap between proper albums. Friend now feels like an essential release in Grizzly Bear’s catalogue, home to a live staple (their creepy, cavernous reconstruction of the Crystals’ “He Hit Me”) and a pivotal moment in guitarist Daniel Rossen’s evolving and increasingly distinct style. The EP’s electric version of “Little Brother”—a six-minute, six-string supernova of a song—remains one of his finest recorded moments with this band.
Shields: Expanded feels like something of a throwback to Friend, thanks in part to the refreshingly pragmatic way that Warp is releasing it. There is an “expanded edition” that contains the original album along with the bonus material, but people who already have Shields can just buy the 12” Shields: B-Sides (and people who don’t care about vinyl can simply buy the extras digitally). Shields was recorded after Grizzly Bear took their first short hiatus; after the time apart (Rossen and bassist Chris Taylor put out solo records; founding vocalist Ed Droste did some traveling), they reconvened in Marfa, Tex., for what would be an unexpectedly discouraging recording session. They worked on about 20 demos there, but none made the record. Shields: Expanded collects the best of these previously unheard Marfa tracks, which amount to captivating sketches, rather than scraps.
The swooping “Taken Down” is driven by Rossen’s babbling-brook finger-picking and an anguished vocal from Droste; “Everyone I Know” is an even sparser evocation of the same mood. Shields wasn’t exactly an upbeat record, but what’s surprising is how dark—at times even violent—these Marfa tracks are. Is this the sound of a band thrashing out their frustrations with an inert recording session, or their anxiety about trying top their past work? “Will Calls”, the best of the demos, definitely seems to be raging at something. Like a rougher-hewn version of Yellow House’s gorgeous finale “Colorado”, it wrestles between soft, somnolent moments and the closest thing Grizzly Bear can come to a genuine freak-out. The chorus—Droste’s unvarnished yelps and Rossen’s joltingly loud guitar—feels like a satisfying exorcism of bottled-up rage.
The last three songs here are remixes and they’re decidedly hit-or-miss. I’m not sure the world needed to hear what a Lindstrøm remix of the effervescently proggy “Gun-Shy” would sound like, and the results are about what you’d expect: The neon-plastic track sounds like an unused instrumental the Norwegian disco producer had lying around, with Droste’s vocal track placed overtop about halfway through. Liars’ take on “A Simple Answer” fares a little better: Fragmented loops of “ahhs” and “oohs” build a misty, fogged-window atmosphere that dissipates once—pretty unwarrentedly—a driving beat interrupts two-thirds of the way through. Luckily, though, there is one straight-up gem in the bunch. Nicolas Jaar doesn’t remix “Sleeping Ute” so much as toss it into to a zero-gravity chamber and watch each element drift around gracefully, asking you to examine it anew. Grizzly Bear’s music is as much about the notes as the spaces between them—and the dust mites floating ethereally in those spaces between. Jaar gets this; and given how carefully his own music conjures space, he’s an intuitive choice for this track. It’s enough to make you wish that he and Darkside collaborator Dave Harrington would give Shields the same full-album treatment they recently gave Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories.
Shields: Expanded doesn’t stand on its own quite the way that the bar-setting Friend EP did. But as far as “deluxe editions” go, it’s so refreshing you (almost) want to call it special: Consistent from start to finish (especially if you end on the Jaar remix), exactly as long as it needs to be, and revealing without being unflattering. For fans, it will come as something of a relief. If the infamous Marfa material that the band thought disappointing was actually this good, then Shields: Expanded is a comforting assurance of how hard it would be for a Grizzly Bear record to actually suck.
