Although the Calgary Flames lost by a single goal in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals-- squandering their chance to become the first Canadian team to take home the trophy since 1993-- the vanquished hockey players' country-folk have no reason to hang their collective heads. Among their luminaries, the Canucks can count a bilingual prime minister who speaks in full sentences, filmmaker Guy Maddin, and Vancouver's preeminent redheaded songwriter, Carl Newman, who has just released, by a stride, the best power-pop album of 2004.
Newman worked through his more angular pop leanings in the mid-1990s with Sub Pop indie rockers Zumpano and is now the primary songwriter in The New Pornographers. To place The Slow Wonder's aesthetics in terms that The New Pornographers fans will understand, these 11 tracks blend Mass Romantic's clipped frenetics, Electric Version's spacious tenderness, and the agile twists and turns of Zumpano, effortlessly humbling all three. On The Slow Wonder, the hooks crack apart and multiply, accruing additional catchiness the way the pumped muscles of a spinach-stuffed Popeye give birth to crops of testosterone-filled goose bumps. At one point in "Drink to Me Babe Then", a languid group of whistlers double themselves harmoniously before a quavering electromagnetic guitar blazes overhead; elsewhere, a fading melodian shoots rubber bands at the stars.
Taken as a single document, The Slow Wonder fits together for a taut 34 minutes without lags or rough spots; viewed as collection of singles, all but a couple tracks would justifiably fill the A-side of a seven-inch. From the catchy drum-fill intro of "Miracle Drug" to "35 in the Shade"'s soaring exit guitar, there's not a misfire to be found. Time and time again, Newman showcases a quaint nostalgia and a layered sense of production that often feels similar to the inventive beauty that made The Shins' Chutes Too Narrow such a whopper of a sophomore release. Like the exquisite chamber pop that Richard Davies and Eric Matthews showcased as Cardinal, these songs have a comfortable Kinks-like feel while still sporting their own unique, keenly crafted hooks.
Throughout the album, Newman keeps the palette varied, cramming enough pop muscularity into his two- and three-minute blasts to infuse this genre with the life it possessed in its 70s heyday. "On the Table" makes use of flourishing ragtime piano, a regal trumpet emerges from the fragile tambourine and deep percussion of "The Cloud Prayer", and "The Town Halo"'s sinewy cello propels like a metallic fuzz bass with zero distortion.
On "Miracle Drug", rat-a-tat surf drums gain momentum when interlaced with brazen rock guitar licks and a quirky storyline: "He was tied to the bed with a miracle drug in one hand/ In the other, a great lost novel that, I understand, was returned with a stamp/ That said 'thank you for your interest, young man.'" Instead of Neko Case's swooping country intonations and general high-end foil, Newman harmonizes here with Sarah Wheeler, who adds exultant punctuation to the track's "So why all the history now?" refrain.
Not mere ear candy, The Slow Wonder's playful, often surrealistic libretto riffs on guilt and innocence, victorious defeat, secret agents, boring rich kids, small-town saviors and the onset of revelations. Newman's concerns rest more with relational discourse and struggles than bubblegum and flowers-- fitting for an artist whose press photos show him asleep with a copy of Foucault's Power/Knowledge. Amid the hard/soft tidal wave of "The Battle for Straight Time", Newman chirps in staccato, "O come sweet life, wash clean my hands/ The revolution has been left to chance/ This dawns on me every morning at about three."
Sounding a lot like a track by The New Pornographers, "On the Table" looks at justice as "the deal between the thieves and exits." When "Come Crash", a seemingly pure and dark love ballad enters the picture, it's more a sleepy love story written by J.G. Ballard than the wimpy sentiments of feckless and freckled romantic: "That's luck, she led, we should be dead/ We eyed the wreck. Good god, we said/ She plants one kiss, for the road, on my chest/ Sirens came after we left." In the Guided by Voices-inflected "35 in the Shade"-- perhaps the album's most metaphorically charged track-- Newman plays with Cleopatra and magicians in order to win an argument, all the while trying not to miss his ride home from a bar.
Although not much longer than an episode of Small Wonder, Newman has created a timeless document. These are soulful sing-alongs with grit, pop nuggets that hold up to hours of repeat play in humid bumper-to-bumper traffic, and ultimately, the sound of a great songwriter hitting his stride.
