The Weakerthans - "Reunion Tour"

The Weakerthans - Civil Twilight (Epitaph 2007)

The Weakerthans - Reunion Tour / Epitaph

Word to the wise: Never go-kart without gloves. The callouses I developed on my hands from four eight-minute races on Monday morning removed whole layers of skin; while the scars will probably look cool, I'm not sure how worth the discomfort is to be my family's own Stigmata Man. I know, another meaningless opening, right? But I wouldn't have used it without thinking of The Weakerthans, who have become my aural go-karting: For years I've struggled to really appreciate John K. Samson and his literate poetics. Even while my peers were soaking it up, I never really understood what the fuss was. Sure, he came from Propagandhi. Sure, he was an accomplished melody maker. But wasn't Lucero doing the same thing?

In other words, I developed some serious callouses for the softer approach to alt-country that The Weakerthans were taking. Perhaps it was a mental association with the much-loathed Wilco or perhaps it was that I was listening to all the wrong songs, but The Weakerthans just never clicked.

On a whim, I decided to take up the challenge again with Reunion Tour. By now, The Weakerthans are a well-known quantity: If you know them, it's either because of Propagandhi or it's because of the critically acclaimed Reconstruction Site. Both are legitimate reasons. Propagandhi was a pretty significant anarchist pop-punk band (and easily the most important out of Winnipeg) in the early- to mid-90s, but Samson was actually only its third bassist behind original member Scott Hopper and Mike Braumeister. When Samson left after 1996's Less Talk, More Rock, he birthed The Weakerthans. It was immediately apparent this was going to be different; after all, John took the name from the film version of Marguerite Duras' autobiographical novel, "The Lover." Not exactly "Eros Plus Massacre," then.

So what's changed on Reunion Tour, and why do we care? The visual is always a good place to start. 2001's Watermark EP aside, Samson and his cohorts have been very grounded in earth tones, browns and oranges and off-whites. It's a warmer invite than the shards of shattered ice that scatter the landscape of the very bleak-looking cover presented here. Is the sound of the album the same?

Judging by opener and first single "Civil Twilight," the answer is a resounding no. Crashing cymbals dominate an anthemic chorus that sounds pretty similar to later Death Cab for Cutie. Though guitarist Stephen Carroll told Uptown magazine that the album features "lots of ambient stuff, tape loops, and some more keyboard than before," and producer Ian Blurton has apparently christened Reunion Tour as the band's "most experimental yet," you don't really hear much of that in the early part of the album. Mostly they're just straight-up solid rockers, which "Relative Surplus Value" definitely is. You've also got a few middle-of-the-road ballads in a song like "Night Windows," and it's this sort of balance that keeps things interesting. Of course, there are also horns on "Big Foot!" It had to happen. The lyrical quality is about where it's always been, Samson's vignettes both touching and sappy at times.

The biggest change, then, is that this really doesn't sound like Samson with a band anymore. It sounds more like a cohesive whole, and while they were working toward that on Reconstruction Site four years ago, this sounds like a fully formed pop-rock group. While early albums reflected Samson's radical shift towards singer/songwriter introspection, this sounds like a blossoming back outward. Samson's always had a talent for making music people can listen to easily... But here he's hit the jackpot. The Weakerthans have created their most listenable album yet. This might be why I cannot dispute its goodness.