It's been five years since Broken Social Scene's last album came out. However, they definitely haven't been slacking. During that time, key members Kevin Drew and Brendan Canning put out solo albums under the Broken Social Scene Presents banner, auxiliary members continued to dominate the indie rock world in their respective bands (Stars, Metric, Jason Collett, etc) and Feist made an appearance on a little show you may heard of called Sesame Street.
More importantly, the morale amongst the core members of this collective was at an all-time low due to reported friction and in-fighting. So there was a time when the prospect of a new BSS was looking pretty slim.
Well now they're back with the fittingly titled Forgiveness Rock Record. Judging from this triumphant return, it appears that all is now well in the BSS camp. This album is easily the most consistent of the BSS releases, which is largely due to the fact that the collective have pared their core membership down to "only" seven members. However, this IS BSS so over twenty "additional members" and "guests" appear on the album, including Feist, Emily Haines, Amy Millan and Pavement's Spiral Stairs.
"World Sick" opens the album with the lush movie soundtrack atmospherics that BSS have become known for. However, the album is loaded with great SONGS... not just sound snippets that have dominated in the past. What is most evident with Forgiveness is the focus on melody. These songs are definitely busy with layered instrumental backdrops but a dominant melodic line keeps the songs from drifting into self-indulgence. As a result, this is definitely their most accessible album to date.
It is really hard to narrow down just three or four highlights from this album since it is great from start to finish. However, my personal faves are the rocking "Forced To Love," the ambient "All to All," the soulful "Sweetest Kill" and "Sentimental X's," which features Haines, Millan and Feist. This is definitely a strong contender for album of the year so far.
You can check out their performance of "Forced To Love" on The Late Show with David Letterman below.
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