Grief as a creative engine
Death Cab for Cutie releases I Built You a Tower, their eleventh studio album, this Friday. But it’s not just another veteran album. Behind it is a story of personal loss and musical rebirth.
Frontman Ben Gibbard went through a separation and divorce during 2023. That pain marked the new songs. Just then, the band began an anniversary tour of Transatlanticism and Plans, two classic albums that connected with new audiences.
“I spent much of 2023 going through this very painful experience of a separation and eventual divorce,” Gibbard said. That experience led him to write about how we compartmentalize grief.
Guitarist Dave Depper remembers the intensity of those concerts: “There was a very strong feeling that there was a power greater than us, not necessarily in a spiritual sense, but in the communion with the audience every night.”
A record made of imperfections
Gibbard credits the anniversary tours with revitalizing his songwriting. The result is an album that embraces the imperfect. Producer John Congleton pushed them to avoid perfectionism.
“Perfection is the enemy of good rock, of good guitar music,” Gibbard said. “All our favorite records sound like this: we hear humanity and collective fallibility.”
Depper agreed: “A big part of why we love those records is because we hear the humanity. And that’s been erased in this age of AI, more than ever.”
They recorded in three weeks in September 2024. The single “Punching the Flowers” uses the image of a child trampling plants as a metaphor for fatalistic frustrations.
This summer they will go on tour with I Built You a Tower, their first tour with new music since 2022.
