Bear necessities

"Twenty years ago, bands like us wouldn't have had a career." Ed Droste of the Brooklyn outfit Grizzly Bear tells JIM CARROLLabout the end of "massive" bands, and what success means in a changing musical landscape

ED DROSTE knows that everything is about to change. His band, Grizzly Bear, release their third album, Veckatimest, this month and while the Brooklyn outfit's previous albums, Horn Of Plentyand Yellow House,took them quite a distance down the road which leads out of the indie underground, the release of Veckatimestwill deliver them into a new genre altogether. As has been the case for so many indie bands of late, the new album and attendant fuss mean a bigger stage is beckoning.

Veckatimestis named after a small uninhabited island off the coast of Cape Cod. It is close to band founder and frontman Droste's grandmother's house, where Grizzly Bear are currently residing and working. As Droste talks, the rest of the band tune up and laugh in the background.

“We’re back at the house that my grandmother kindly lends us when we want to get away from New York,” Droste explains. “We’re rehearsing before we hit the road for the next year, so we’re getting our live act together in the living room, hanging out and cooking a lot.”

Inevitably, the four band members will also spend time discussing, debating and dissecting the ins and outs of what lies ahead. Over the past few years, Grizzly Bear have been steadily gaining followers for their sound – a beautiful amalgamation of chamber-folk, pristine harmonies and subtle, beguiling atmospherics.

But the recent success of similarly aligned bands (see Fleet Foxes), oodles of love from their peers (Radiohead have taken them on tour and have consistently bigged them up), a fantastic new record and a label chomping at the bit means Veckatimestcomes with expectations.

“I think we try to tune out as much as we can, but we are aware of what is going on,” says Droste of the buzz surrounding the release. “We have a press agent and a manager who tell us what is happening and there are certain websites we read because we’re interested in what is going on.

“Generally, you can’t let those expectations into your head and influence the creative process. I’m not going to lie, it’s a bit overwhelming right now and none of us expected the response to be as big as it is. It’s new territory for us.”

In a way, so is the new record. The playing is sharper, the ideas are bolder, the projections deeper and the sounds sweeter. Droste may protest that they're just making the music they want to make, yet it's clear something in the mix has changed since Yellow Housein 2006.

“Obviously a raised profile gives people more confidence, but generally speaking it’s more of an experience thing that gives us confidence,” the singer says. “It’s more about the fact that we have played more shows and we’ve become more confident in our own shoes and in our roles in the band.

“Everyone is singing and playing more confidently and we’re a lot more secure in what they do. It means when there’s criticism in the band that people don’t take it to heart any more. I think everyone has just matured a lot.”

Grizzly Bear are in the vanguard of indie bands who may experience a giant leap forward in 2009. To date, their coverage has largely come from blogs, websites and underground media. Their profile has now grown to the stage where mainstream outlets are beginning to take an interest.

“It’s very exciting to see these albums from Dirty Projectors and Animal Collective and us getting such a leg up and see music that is a little leftfield find a bigger audience – and that has a large part to do with the internet,” says Droste.

"But when you say stepping up to the mainstream plate, that remains to be seen. I mean, are songs from Veckatimestreally going to be on commercial radio? Probably not. But the profile of those bands will continue to grow and that is really heartening to see. Before now, before the rise of websites and blogs, it would be really hard, if not impossible, for a band like us to get the kind of bump worldwide."

But are the band really pitching for plays on their local hit music radio station?

“Well, no, I suppose not. I mean, commercial radio would help gain new fans and sell more records, but it is no longer the key to any kind of sustainable success. So much profile building now is down to word of mouth. It’s a different model now. There are fewer massive groups and more bigger mid-range groups, and it’s really interesting to see the different alleyways and paths people are taking with their music.

“No one can complain because 20 years ago, bands like us just wouldn’t have a career. Yes, it’s harder and harder to make money from record sales, but touring is still a viable way for a band to survive and that is how we make our living.”

For all the positives this brave new world brings, Droste wonders if people have the time and patience to go through all this new music. “The downside to the overload of new music is that there just isn’t the time to process these albums properly. People will overlook releases or put them on shuffle or delete the albums from their hard-drives prematurely or dismiss it quicker because there’s another must-hear leak which came out that day.”

Then, there are mixed feelings about the viability of the album as an art form. “When we talk with our peers, you do get a tinge of sadness about the fact that the art of the album as a whole is dying a little. People will pick and choose the tracks they like and delete the ones which don’t grab them immediately and they don’t listen to tracks in the sequence in which they were intended to be heard.

“There’s a different relationship between the album and the listener now to what was the case when I was growing up. I mean, how much longer can the concept of an album work or survive? I don’t want to be doom and gloom but things change and you have to go with the flow. After all, there have always been people who just wanted the single and that did them fine.”

Those concerns are for the future. The most immediate concern is the tour, which will see the band leave their refuge by the sea and take the new album around the world (Irish dates can be expected in the autumn, says Droste).

Touring is something he is looking forward to, at least when the first couple of shows are out of the way. “Those first shows can be a little, how do I put it, sticky”, says Droste.

“We haven’t played in public in a long time and I think we will be looking at each other at the beginning and going ‘OK, we haven’t done this in a while, have we?’ But when you’re on tour, you quickly fall into a rhythm of playing because you’re doing a show every day and you lock into a groove.”

Veckatimestis released today on Warp Records

The Pitchfork effect

WHEN Ed Droste talks about how blogs and websites have helped Grizzly Bear and other indie acts to grow their profiles, he's testifying to the Pitchfork effect.

Wherever the Chicago-based websiteleads in terms of acts, that part of the internet which comments on new music tends to follow. With the demise in power and influence of traditional print music media, it's this online communitythat fills in the blanks and rates (or slates) new releases.

This has meant a boom for bands who fit into that Pitchfork indie demographic– something which is welcomed with open arms by those bands and their labels.

But this changing of the guard doesn't mean a brave new worldfor every act. Just as the previous wave of music publications were often (rightly) accused of just covering certain niches and genres, there is all too often a homogeneity to the acts which receive coverage from the new guns on the block.

Many of the flagship indie acts you'll find in the Pitchfork Nation, for instance, tend to be cut from the same cloth. Of course, if you're a member of this gang, you're not complaining.