Post-Nothing is a record with a one-track mind, but not in the way that you might think. While Japandroids’ debut album - a punk-rock whirlwind of teenage angst and power chords - is singularly concerned with members of the opposite sex, it's also notable for its resolute commitment to its own thematic preoccupations. At the very least, it could be construed as a tacit reaction against albums of the wildly tangential sort. Brian King, one half of the Vancouver duo, elaborates on this point: “There’s alot of albums where I find that the band have one big single; and that’ll come out before the album, and when they’re actually putting out their album, because that single’s so popular, it has to be on the album - but it’s a weird wildcard on what [would otherwise be] a really cohesive album.”
Post-Nothing is certainly that; following the release of two EPs – All Lies in 2007 and Lullaby Death Jams the following year – the album’s release in the spring of last year attracted widespread praise for its maximal, heartfelt odes to misspent (depending on your viewpoint) youth. On the back of the release of Post-Nothing, King and bandmate David Prowse were all set to begin their first major tour when tragedy threatened to cut short their adventure: “We were going to go on a six week tour, right before the album was released in Canada...we played one show on Calgary, and Brian had this medical emergency [a potentially fatal perforated ulcer] the very next morning, and I drove Brian to the hospital the morning after that gig. Long story short, tour cancelled.”
Twenty-eight dates were struck from the tour as a result, but Prowse bristles at the insignificance of the fact: “Cancelling the tour is one thing, but Brian could’ve died. So, six weeks of touring isn’t a big fucking deal.” As raw as the memory remains, the duo are still able to apply levity to the topic as they namecheck notable perforated ulcer deaths: “J.R.R. Tolkien, Rudolph Valentino, and what’s-his-face... James Joyce.”
Perhaps these ready-to-hand reference points inform the title of forthcoming 7” single 'Art Czars', due out in April. The single itself is a bit of a curveball, too; its phlegmatic refrain of “here’s your money back / here’s your punk rock back” is a world away from the lovelorn entreaties so prevalent on Post-Nothing, trading instead on angular riffs resplendent in spite and spittle. King confirms as much: “That song definitely has like a lyrical [theme to it], and even the way I sing, the feel of the song is definitely alot different.”
King goes on to explain that 'Art Czars' was recorded during the sessions that would eventually form the bulk of Post-Nothing, and was initially pencilled in for inclusion on the album: “We actually recorded that song to go on the record, and when I sat and listened to it, start to finish, trying to decide on tracklisting... it just always stood out to me as something that just didn’t fit, and the record seemed alot more cohesive, and was alot more like an actual record, when you took it off.”
'Art Czars'' remarkable lapel-grabbing growl raises the specter of 'what if': given Japandroids' fastidious approach to the thematic direction of their album, could a different longplayer have emerged from the Post-Nothing recordings had they been inclined to venture forth into more aggressive territory?
“I don’t think it’s impossible. There’s a reason that every song in this series didn’t go in the album. Some of them we didn’t get to record; we ran out of time or whatever”, says King, referring to the series of singles that Japandroids will release throughout the year after 'Art Czars'. King affirms that the series also affords the duo some creative freedoms: “I think that’s the fun of doing the single series, because it’s not an album and everything comes out on its own, there’s no need to be cohesive, so you can be a bit more experimental – on the single series, we could put a song out that’s super fucking dark if we wanted to.”
Conversation turns to the internet. Tellingly, both King and Prowse are furtively browsing on their Macbooks before we begin our interview in a back room of King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut. Of the two, King takes a far more assiduous approach to the band's press, be it good or bad. The 'W' word (yes, Wikipedia) is uttered in passing, and it doesn't take long before King begins to riff on his bete noir.
“Brian hates inaccuracies,” chirps Prowse, cradling a green mug of whiskey and coke.
“I do hate inaccuracies. Something that happens that annoys me is that someone will write an article about us. Something in the article will be wrong. I mean, there are always errors. But, say you have a big article with a bunch of things that are wrong. That gets referenced. It gets put on Wikipedia, and then it’s like ‘oh, this is gospel because it was in this article’, but the article’s wrong, but it doesn’t matter, and so you can’t ever change it or edit it or delete it because it’ll always stay there just because there’s ‘a reference’. Well, I could write a note on a fuckin’ piece of toilet paper, scan it, put it on my blog and now I have a reference, and it stays on my Wikipedia page. It frustrates me no end.”
King articulates his point eloquently, and continues in much the same way as he addresses the possibility of “evolving” the Japandroids sound in the future while acknowledging the perceived limitations of their genre that they, paradoxically, see as liberating.
“It doesn’t take very much in music to be powerful – it takes a few chords and the right words...I think we’re capable of just as much or more than any other band by using the rawest, most simple, generic tools, which is just like a few big chords and a few words. Having said that, we’re a two piece band, so we never had the opportunity to make music that’s alot more complex or on multiple levels; we don’t have alot of experience being in bands, we don’t have formal musical training, you know. Neither of us are poets.”
King and Prowse allow themselves a smirk at this self-deprecating remark. Teenage angst has rarely been so self-aware.
Image: Leigh Righton
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