Next year will see the return of Harper Simon, Paul’s kid, with the release of a new album, ‘Division Street’ produced by Tom Rothrock, who has worked with Foo Fighters (‘Foo Fighters’), Elliott Smith (‘Either/Or’, ‘XO’, ‘Figure 8’) and Beck (‘Mellow Gold’, ‘Odelay’) among many others.
If ‘Bonnie Brae’, the first song that we can listen to, is any indication of the direction of the new album, it’s quite a departure from his previous work, the self-titled album released in 2009. Gone the melancholic country-folk tunes, on this track, the music is more rock’ n’ roll with a fast tempo, multi layers, and vocals both eerie and warm. This song has some carefree I-walk-happy-under-the-sun vibe going on, despite some possible internal drama. Effectively, according to what Simon said to Hangout Altsounds, the songs of the album seem to have a common theme of duality:
The title track seems to carry the whole meaning, as Simon said he sees ‘the character in the song Division Street as being at a moment where life can go a couple different ways’.
‘I think these songs tend to be like a snapshot of a character at a pivotal moment', he said, 'They could go this way or that way on the metaphorical Division Street: up or down, negative or positive, to the light or to self-destruction’… ‘Or they’re looking back at a moment they didn’t recognize as pivotal. Because we rarely do.’
Simon also explained the intention behind this more confident new sound:
‘The mission was to make the kind of Rock ‘n’ Roll record I would want to listen to myself, which sounds simple but is, in fact, incredibly difficult.’…’I felt challenged and inspired by the idea of making a modern psychedelic folk-rock album, a Tom Rothrock production like XO, but then the Velvet Underground and the Stones kept entering in, Elliott Smith was very influenced by the Beatles but my guitar playing is more influenced by Keith Richards. And I kept wanting to emphasize more lo-fi elements.’
I already knew that Harper liked Elliott, and with Tom Rothrock in the party, the influence has to be even more obvious despite what he just said… Let’s see, division is typically an Elliott Smith’s theme! He has a dark/uplifting song called ‘Division Day’ which precisely deals with dualities like light and self destruction, and he sings ‘Driving around up and down division street/I used to like it here/It just burns me out to remember’ in 'Punch and Judy’,… and this couldn’t be a coincidence! And I am not even mentioning that Elliott has that line, 'the devil's on Bonnie Brae', in 'Let's Turn The Record Over',… may be I am going too far.
Harper Simon’s own ‘Division Street’ was recorded with many upscale musicians, such as Pete Thomas from Elvis Costello’s Attractions on drums, the Strokes’ Nikolai Fraiture on bass, Inara George on vocals, Feist’s musical director Brian LeBarton on synths, and even Bright Eyes’ Nate Walcott and Wilco’s Mikael Jorgensen!!
Simon added, ‘The I’m very lucky, everybody that we asked to come and guest on the record showed up.’ The album is out on March 25th via Play It Again Sam.