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May 20, 2008

The Making Of Narrow Stairs

Today your regular bloggers have been replaced by Ben, Chris, Nick, and Jason of Death Cab For Cutie. The band's new album Narrow Stairs is out now. DCFC are not professional bloggers, so please send them tips.

By Chris Walla
There's a lot of b-roll in our world: Everyone wants the 'behind the scenes scoop', or something like it. When we first started with Atlantic it seemed harmless and silly and novel, but as we went on, it began to seem harmful and annoying and intrusive (as in, it's not a green room anymore if there's a camera crew in it).

The post-modern thing to do would be to shut it all down. The post-post-modern approach, though, is the one we've now adopted: We bought cameras. When someone wants b-roll now, it's understood that Nick shoots b-roll on their b-roll, resulting in... Well, a lot of ridiculous shit. It's gonna be a good movie.

Sadly, our cameras didn't capture all the magical, unconscious, intimate in-between moments during the making of "The Making Of Narrow Stairs." It's really a shame. I mean, Ben made this totally average joke... It was awesome. And I farted. But you'd never know, because we weren't rolling. It's such a travesty, but one we're working desperately to move forward from.

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7 Comments

This is super because what celebrity rock stars really need to bring them down to earth is the reasurrance that everything they do is worth recording forever.

Posted by: dannygutters at 05/20/08 3:28 PM | Reply
Score = -3 Vote up Vote down

Thats a very cool type of recording ethic. That way overpolished sound that many bands get when they hit that major label, i think, might have something to do with separating the tracks and focusing on the peices and getting everything 'right'. It comes out sounding sterile and all of that warmth is gone. With this new album, though, there is a noticeably warm and live quality to it thats just great.

Posted by: Ryan J at 05/20/08 3:46 PM | Reply
Score = 3 Vote up Vote down
MuffinsQ

halfway through i realized i had stopped listening and was mesmerized by chris's hair

Posted by: MuffinsQ profile link at 05/20/08 7:41 PM | Reply
Score = 1 Vote up Vote down

that's the raw-ness of the sound, just feeling the music and leaving the possibility of overproduction out of the question. It doesn't mean it hasn't been given some thought, it's just different

Posted by: ana at 05/21/08 1:53 AM | Reply
Score = 0 Vote up Vote down

these guys are amazing...there is a reason they are better than fob and panic and all those one hit wonders that only care about making money and marrying wanna - be 'calebrities'...they know what music means....

Posted by: isa at 05/21/08 5:43 PM | Reply
Score = 0 Vote up Vote down

these guys are amazing...there is a reason they are better than fob and panic and all those one hit wonders that only care about making money and marrying wanna - be 'calebrities'...they know what music means....

Posted by: isa at 05/21/08 5:44 PM | Reply
Score = 0 Vote up Vote down

these guys are amazing...there is a reason they are better than fob and panic and all those one hit wonders that only care about making money and marrying wanna - be 'celebrities'...they know what music means....

Posted by: isabel at 05/21/08 5:45 PM | Reply
Score = -1 Vote up Vote down

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