"DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE, TRANSATLANTICISM
(BARSUK RECORDS)
[BY JOHN PAUL ARMSTRONG]
It's been an overwhelming few weeks. My small family unit discovered our 8-month-old kitten had an incurable disease (F.I.P.), causing her to slowly starve to death. One of the most gifted singer/songwriters of our generation violently decided life wasn't worth living. My burdens seemed to grow heavier than I felt I was able to withstand. I wanted to escape to a remote nowhere and cry out and hope for comfort.
A few days after staring mindlessly at the television, unable to cope, Transaltanticism wrapped itself around my distractions. Death Cab for Cutie has continually been solace for my ears, from their first release to their last (as I'm sure they are to many of you). With anticipation I listened, late at night, while working on an overdue project. At first, most of the songs glanced past me, my mind focused on a task, until I got to the title track.
There was nothing particularly overwhelming, nothing new, nothing that challenged my perceptions of "what music is." It was simple, a piano, a guitar, background sounds, slow, methodical and building. But it sustained and lingered, waking me, not literarily, but somehow I could feel myself letting go, swaying in arms more capable than my own. I felt myself saying to God, "I need you so much closer," along with the song. Seven minutes later I had to listen again. And again. And again. Then I played the album from the beginning. It had begun to sink in.
I could write about the intricacies in the music, the crisp pop mastery that transitions to sweeping middle strokes and closes with intimate comfort; about the subtle Postal Service influence; about their broadening oeuvre, lyrical commonality and familiarity; and about their eerie tribute to Elliott Smith on "Lack of Color." Each item would be worthwhile and noteworthy, but the album to me has become more personal and evocative, more about feeling than analysis, and, as only God could ordain, it found my ears when they needed most to hear.
Transatlanticism is about our separation, our longing, our joy and confusion. Oceans and islands isolate us from communion with God (or family or friends or lovers). We need something beyond ourselves; we innately long for it. Tranatlanticism is a complete story of the ride and extremes, the volume of my life (and maybe yours).
I start each day with the hope of new visions, limitless horizons like a flat world where I can "travel just by folding a map," welcomed by a fresh start ("The New Year"). Hope is torn as I begin to think I shouldn't be so instinctive and naïve, selfish and misguided ("Lightness"). I follow habit and formality "afraid of change" and watch life happen, nothing to keep my fingers warm ("Title and Registration").
I'm apt to wait in line like everyone else, anticipating something, but waiting for failure ("Expo '86"). There are times of sullenness and realization "Youth is fleeting, old age is just around the bend" and I settle into the inevitable ("The Sound of Settling"), an existential rage where everything is meaningless ("Tiny Vessels"). And that's when I hit bottom with nothing left, nothing to hold, nothing to feel, and "The distance is quite simply much too far" It seems much farther than ever before; I need connection and comfort ("Transatlanticism"). It's time to give up the controls, release to God, And the strong scent of evergreen from the passenger seat as you are driving me home ("Passenger Seat"). Therein I find peace ("Death of an Interior Decorator") and reconciliation ("We Looked Like Giants") in the arms of God, and I find my perspective altered ("Lack of Color").
No matter the oceans or islands I create, the distances that appear around me, no matter how long I wait in line for hope to become failure, yearn for more and settle for less, no matter all the lives that vanish before me and the burdens that build a wall, I will always cry "I need you so much closer." For me, I just needed to stop, lose focus of the barriers and borders surmounting my vision, and be welcomed by the arms that were there all along."
