How is it possible that the music-magazine Intro puts an act onto their cover, only to describe it as »Softrock« in the respective article? The Intro, of all magazines, in which the »Soft Power« of Gonzales was flunked and which coined the term »gig-indie« specifically for local softrockers like Tele. It’s probably, because Kaputt, the ninth album that the Canadian songwriter Dan Bejar has released under the name of Destroyer, is exactly no tribute to the yacht-rock of the seventies. Instead, the album satisfies the listening-habits of many 35+ editors, who, in the early nineties, didn’t only have an ear for SST-bands, but also for British Electro-Pop. In particular, Dan Bejar’s singing (which on the previous LP, Trouble In Dreams, sounded, as if Gary Numan was forced into a Ziggy-Stardust-costume) reminds the listener of the lascivious and world-weary acts of those days. Electronic’s Getting Away With It, ABC’s Love Conquers All and Being Boring by the Pet Shop Boys are only a few examples. There, the sound also differed from the sequency House-Pop of the previous decade, by interlacing all kinds of references to the seventies, such as WahWah-licks, female soul-choires and disco-strings. Kaputt was done without (actual) strings. Instead, well-echoed trumpet-, fife- and saxophone-solos, but especially the voice of Vancouver’s Soul-veteran Sibel Thrasher (Ex-RAMP) mark the album’s style. No matter whether she vocalizes in the manner of Minnie Riperto or whether she sings full stanzas in unison together with Bejar: it’s mostly her achievement that the new Destroyer-credo (less words and harmonies in favor of poignant lyrics and hypnotizing moods) worked out so very well.
Kaputt
