Carrying a tune

2007-08-17

Bishop Allen talk travels

PROFILE. Bishop Allen doesn’t need anyone’s prayers. After the positive atten­tion they received for their catchy self-released debut album, “Charm School,” band members Justin Rice and Christian Rudder dabbled in other mediums, particularly independent cinema (appearing in director-friend Andrew Bujalski’s “Mutual Appreciation” and “Funny Ha Ha,” respectively).

In 2006, these refresh­ingly honest Harvard boys decided to assign themselves some home­work by, in what seems to have been a double-dog-dare situation, recording an EP together each month of the year, along with drummer Cully Symington and the sweet-voiced Darbie Nowatka.

Experimenting with more complex musical arrangements and wittier lyrics gave them the ability to avoid the indie-pop pratfalls: They’re sensitive but not whiny and poppy, with brains and twee but not too pre­cious. The pro­duct of this prolific period is their newly released sophomore album, “The Broken String,” which balances buoyancy with deep introspection. Comprising nine reworked songs from their 2006 EPs and three new tracks, Rudder says choosing which of the 58 songs would make the new album “wasn’t too hard.

“We knew the ones we liked the best for the most part and then narrowed it down from there by choos­ing the ones we thought would make an interesting and varied, yet coherent, record.”
“String” suc­ceeds on that level, side­step­ping inconsis­tency and diving headfirst into eclecticism with its public transpor­ta­tion-induced stream-of-conscious­ness musings (“The Chinatown Bus,” “Flight 180”).

Rice says that the constant momentum of being on the road has informed the band’s songwriting but not in that classic rock sort of way.

“Touring is something we’ve done enough times now that there’s not some sort of surprise, but, at the same time, there’s some­thing about changing scen­ery and being in dif­fer­ent places and exper­ien­cing all the different things avail­able out there from com­mu­nity to community,” he says.

Another constant theme in Bishop Allen’s songs is the proverbial post-colle­giate ennui and not being able to live up to expectations.

“There’s definitely a big part of me that doesn’t want to end up disappoin­ted, and so I always expect things to turn out badly, and, if they turn out well, then I’m pleasantly surprised,” Rice says. “I also don’t know how to experience success. I don’t know if there’s ever a given moment when I sit back and accept that success has occurred. It all just seems like an ongoing progress, not a clear moment of closure where I feel like I’ve achieved something.”

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