Shields (album)

Untitled

Shields is the fourth studio album by American indie rock band Grizzly Bear, released on September 18, 2012 on Warp Records. Produced by bassist and multi-instrumentalist Chris Taylor, the album was preceded by the singles, "Sleeping Ute" and "Yet Again".

Shields has been described by the members of Grizzly Bear as their most collaborative album, with vocalist and guitarist Daniel Rossen noting that their aim was "[to] write and make music that is as collaborative as possible, so that we have a product that we all feel a sense of authorship over as a collective."

Production

Background

After extensive touring in support of the band's third studio album, Veckatimest (2009), Grizzly Bear undertook a six-month hiatus from band-related activities. Vocalist Ed Droste noted, "There was such a level of exhaustion that I really needed to pretend I wasn't in the band for a little bit. I needed to be back in my life with my friends and my spouse, and live a day-to-day existence that had nothing to do with music. That was really good for everybody."

During the break, several band members wrote and recorded demos for their next studio album, with vocalist and guitarist Daniel Rossen recording and releasing a solo EP, Silent Hour/Golden Mile (2012), featuring tracks initially intended for Shields.

Recording

Regarding the band's eventual return, Droste noted, "Coming back together to try to write and record was like being in junior high again - after you go away for the summer, the first couple of weeks are slightly awkward when you get back to school. Then, you get back into the swing."

In June 2011, the band moved to Marfa, Texas to begin recording their fourth studio album, with bassist and multi-instrumentalist Chris Taylor returning to his role as producer. Droste noted, "We had passed through before and there is a great arts collective and vibe. We decided to rent a place and make our next album there." The band recorded "an album's worth of material" in Marfa, but ultimately abandoned the majority of tracks. Vocalist Ed Droste noted, "We were like, 'We're ready to do this!' Then, we got there and recorded twelve songs and were like, 'This isn't quite there.'" Vocalist and guitarist Daniel Rossen elaborated, "We didn’t have that unspoken momentum, that unspoken understanding of what everyone is into." Only two songs from these sessions made it onto the finished album; "Sleeping Ute" and "Yet Again".

The band subsequently started afresh in early 2012, returning to Droste's grandmother's home in Cape Cod, where the band had previously recorded its second studio album, Yellow House (2006). Regarding their return to Yellow House, Droste noted, "It's so funny that we went back there in the end. It’s my grandmother’s house, we know it, and we can use it for free. And as soon as we got there, things started happening. [...] We just sat by the fire, Dan strumming, me singing, and it happened. Some of the best songs on the record, like "Speak in Rounds" and "Half Gate", came out of that. We stayed there in isolation for two months straight." Droste stated that he and Rossen decided to "'try writing from the bottom up. We’ve never done it before.’ There’s a little bit of fear there because it’s a new process we’ve never tried. We’ve never sat side by side and said, ‘Let’s literally, out of the ether, start writing songs together.’ A couple of songs came that way, and that’s why they’re verse me, chorus Dan. [...] Suddenly the synergy hit, and the momentum struck, and then everyone got excited. And that’s when the ball started to roll, and then we just started playing around, and people were much more open.”"

Regarding the album's overall aesthetic, Ed Droste stated, "It's very in-your-face - the drums and vocals are clearer and louder. It's not as dreamy and pastoral and sleepy as past efforts, and there's a lot of raw vocal takes, which is something we don't normally do."

The album was mixed by Michael Brauer.

Writing and composition

The band has described the songwriting process for Shields as more collaborative than on past releases, with vocalist Ed Droste noting, "As we get older, more confident, and more mature, we're becoming more comfortable with stepping on each other's toes." Pairs of band members did writing retreats with each other, with band members regularly building off of other members' ideas.

Regarding the album's lyrical content, Ed Droste noted, "Lyrically, it's definitely our most verbose album as well. It's funny, because I think back to a song like "Colorado", where I was basically singing ten words over and over again for five minutes straight - and that's it. There's nothing on this album like that. There's a lot more there, verbally, and it's definitely emotionally charged."

Regarding the album's thematic content, Daniel Rossen noted, "There’s a lot of talk about negotiating distance from people in your life. We were dealing with that in various forms, learning what it means to be alone, learning what it means to be close to somebody, certain things coming to a head. It just feels like a major difficulty in life." Droste elaborated, "There’s a desire to be autonomous, but there’s also this great fear of being alone, and there’s this constant feeling of, ‘How do you reconcile this?’ There’s this need for space, but there’s also this, ‘Come closer come closer.’"

Artwork

The album's artwork features paintings throughout by American artist Richard Diebenkorn, with its front cover featuring his 1981 piece, Blue Club.

Release

A followup to Veckatimest was first announced on May 10, 2011. The release date, as well as a song "Sleeping Ute", the track listing and tour dates were announced on June 5, 2012, while the title and cover art was announced on July 9, 2012. A second song from the album, "Yet Again," was released on August 2, 2012. On September 9, 2012, Shields was streamed in its entirety on NPR.

Reception

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	(85/100)
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic
The A.V. Club	(A-)
BBC Music	(favourable)
Beats Per Minute	(78%)
Drowned In Sound
The Guardian
The Observer
Pitchfork Media	(9.1/10)
Slant Magazine
Under the Radar	(8.5/10)
Two Men and a Marmot	(Very Positive)

Shields has received mostly positive reviews so far. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average score of 85, based on 28 reviews, indicating "Universal Acclaim".

Pitchfork Media's Lindsay Zoladz gave the album a Best New Music designation, writing "While there's no question that Grizzly Bear's last two records have sounded gorgeous, critics of the band have wondered if that's enough. Shields, the band's fourth and most compositionally adventurous record, should put those concerns to bed. Though full of baroque, detail-rich production and latticework melodies, Shields also offers an emotionally resonant core." Under the Radar's Ryan Hamm called Shields an album "filled with wonderful little moments that add up to create a remarkable whole." In another positive review, Allmusic's Heather Phares wrote: "While it's not as obviously big a statement as Veckatimest was, Shields is plenty ambitious in its own right, and its complexity demands and rewards patient listening." The A.V. Club's Chris DeVille gave the album a positive review, praising the contributions of the band's rhythm section, Chris Taylor and Christopher Bear, stating, "On an album that touches repeatedly on the barriers people build between each other, the members of Grizzly Bear have forged further ahead into sweet synchronicity. Sam Cleeve of Drowned in Sound called Shields "[..] [A] warm-blooded record, beholden to analogue gear and flawless mastering — one destined to fit snugly on a turntable rather than to live as ones and zeros on your iPod."

Kevin Liedel of Slant Magazine, on the other hand, gave the album a mixed review, writing "But while the band admirably seeks to avoid mimicking Veckatimest's themes, it neither expands on those motifs nor presents anything interesting in their place. Pretty but formless, Shields plays like a calculated retreat into something altogether indistinct and inconsequential." Reflecting on the album's collaborative production process, The Observer's Kitty Empire wrote: "It's possible these greater levels of democracy have muddied Grizzly Bear's immediacy. It's more likely, though, that Shields is a grower and that Grizzly Bear are artists not merely computing business plans."

Track listing

All songs written by Grizzly Bear.

1. Sleeping Ute – 4:35
2. Speak in Rounds – 4:24
3. Adelma – 1:02
4. Yet Again – 5:18
5. The Hunt – 3:44
6. A Simple Answer – 6:00
7. What's Wrong – 5:44
8. Gun-Shy – 4:30
9. Half Gate – 5:29
10. Sun in Your Eyes – 7:06

Personnel

Grizzly Bear

• Christopher Bear - drums, percussion, backing vocals, drum machine, lap steel, wurlitzer, synths
• Edward Droste - lead vocals
• Daniel Rossen - lead vocals, guitars, pianos, synths, cello, The Wheel, horn and string arrangements
• Chris Taylor - bass guitar, backing vocals, synths, saxophones, clarinet, bass clarinet, flutes, drum machine, The Wheel, horn and string arrangements

Additional musicians

• Tatum Greenblatt - trumpet, flugelhorn
• Louis Shwadron - french horn
• Nat Baldwin - upright bass

Recording personnel

• Chris Taylor - producer, recording
• Michael Brauer - mixing
• Ryan Gilligan - engineer
• Yale Yng-Wong - assistant recording engineer
• Jake Aron - assistant recording engineer
• Bob Ludwig - mastering

Artwork

• Richard Diebenkorn - art
• Ben Tousley - design and art direction

External link

• Warp Records' page on Shields