September 27, 2010 - 9:56pm
Chris Gee, Arts & Entertainment Writer
Caribou
With Emeralds
Thursday, September 30 at 8 p.m.
Starlite Room (10030–102 St.)
$18 at Blackbyrd and Ticketmaster
After playing a sold-out show in Edmonton this past summer, Dan Snaith of Caribou has already returned, poised to see how many more dancers he can conjure up onto the floor.
Recently shortlisted for the 2010 Polaris Prize with his thought-provoking album Swim, Snaith ensures that his music is constantly changing, even within the span of a few months, and that his September show won't be a repeat of June.
"The songs that we were playing [this summer] just kind of evolved naturally[,]" Snaith says. "It just keeps it interesting for us, to keep things changing all the time."
From the point when he started his career under the provincial moniker Manitoba, to a few years ago when he won the 2008 Polaris Prize with his album Andorra, Caribou has never limited himself to only one genre. Snaith has gone in multiple directions over his career — from the jangly shoegaze of Up in Flames and the less calculated '60s Brit-rock noise of Andorra, to his current upbeat dance record Swim. But when asked about the reasons for these sudden direction changes, Snaith is still unsure about the answer himself.
"There's no method, because you're just led by whatever feels like fun," Snaith explains. "If I thought of a melody while I was eating my lunch, I'll record that and try to play different chords on top of that or […] program a sample from an old record. It's never gotten boring for that reason, because I'm always excited to try something different."
Snatih's willingness to go wherever the creative flow takes him has also shifted the mood of his live shows. The dance music of Swim is a clear difference from years past, not only from him but for his audience as well.
"It has definitely changed the atmosphere of [our] shows," Snaith admits. "There's been lots of shows this year that have turned into big dance parties […] which is great and it's something totally new for us."
Despite this, the Dundas, Ontario native has managed to carry the signature psychedelic Caribou sound throughout his career, often without even trying.
"It just happens. It's me making all the music, and they're made during the same time period so the same ideas are filtering around through all the tracks," Snaith says. "It's always been interesting to me [to find] that things are coherent just by accident almost."
However, his continuing success and rising public profile in the Canadian music scene has played a huge role in giving him the confidence level necessary to release his most accessible and danceable offering to date.
Winning the Polaris Prize for Andorra was a "nice affirming thing" for Snaith, but that didn't stop him from looking in a new direction. Underneath the spatial landscapes of throbbing dance rhythms, Swim is complete with Snaith's own vocals, something that he has been adding gradually over his past few efforts.
"The first album I sung on was Up In Flames. [I was] more tentatively using small snippets of vocals as an instrument rather than a lead vocal." Snaith adds, "I wasn't even singing live [then]."
"And the next record I started singing one song live and then gradually started singing more and more […] I'm a much better singer than I was [before] just 'cause now I do it every night."
Snaith's talent for singing and songwriting, which has left his doctorate in mathematics collecting dust, was something he just stumbled upon by accident. He doesn't over-think things, and most of what he makes is a product of what mental space he happens to occupy at the time. Just like his entire impromptu music career, even the titles to his songs have little to do with the actual music.
"Early on, tracks like 'Paul's Birthday' — I'd forgotten to get my friend Paul a birthday present so, it was actually a pretty terrible birthday present that I named that track after him," he explains. "Often, the titles don't really have anything to do with the music, but they have something to do with something going on in my personal life."
