**THE MAKING OF Celebration Rock BY Japandroids - FEATURING David Prowse, Jesse Gander and Steven Hyden**

Intro:

Dan Nordheim: You’re listening to Life of the Record. Classic albums, told by the people who made them. My name is Dan Nordheim.

Japandroids formed in 2006 in Vancouver, British Columbia by Brian King and David Prowse. After self-releasing two EPs, they turned their attention to their debut full-length album. Post-Nothing was released in 2009 by Unfamiliar Records and was an unexpected success. They signed to Polyvinyl and began recording their second album in between tours. Celebration Rock was eventually released in 2012.

In this episode, for the 10th anniversary, David Prowse, engineer, Jesse Gander and writer, Steven Hyden look back on how the album came together. This is the making of Celebration Rock.

Steven Hyden: My name is Steven Hyden, I'm an author and music critic, and I'm here to talk about Celebration Rock. For me the significance of the title Celebration Rock was celebrating what rock and roll can be. And that just felt like such a refreshing message in 2012. Because it really was a time like, where it was almost like, people cheering for rock and roll to be dead. You know, that was my feeling because you'd always read these think pieces about, you know, “Rock music is irrelevant, rock is dead, you know, no one cares about it, the kids don't like it anymore.” Yada, yada, yada. And it just seemed like so many people were predicting the end of rock and almost wanting to will it into existence. So to see a band just come out and say, “We're celebrating this music, we're celebrating rock and roll, we're celebrating its history, its lineage, we're making a record that is drawn from this continuum and we want to add to it. And we're doing this in, you know, the most straightforward, earnest way possible.” I just found that to be so inspiring, you know, it was almost like, they could only get away with that, because they were so outside the indie rock world. To me, the magic of the album is the sort of ordinariness of this band, and how they were able to make this transcendent record. Because they just believed in rock music that much (laughs). Like a really is sort of like a, it's like this heartwarming sort of miracle type story.

David Prowse: Hey, this is Dave from Japandroids, and we are talking about the 2012 album, Celebration Rock. So Japandroids were and to some extent, still are based in Vancouver, BC, Canada, which is a bit of a hinterland, culturally, even within Canada, let alone worldwide. So we're not completely off the map but we're not one of the big cities that everybody's looking to, for, you know, what's what, in terms of art/music/culture. So, you know, we did our thing and Vancouver, we were getting a little bit of buzz locally, but there was a feeling that things were pretty stagnant. It was pretty common amongst our peer group for people to make a couple records, maybe get a little buzz locally, but not really going anywhere. And then maybe you move to Montreal, or you move to Toronto, or maybe you just start a new band in Vancouver. So we were sort of hitting that moment after we made Post-Nothing. Brian and I were both quite ambitious. And I had no problem just harassing anybody I knew who put out records and I literally couldn't get anyone in Vancouver to put out our stuff. It was pretty demoralizing and we knew we had a cool album that we were really proud of. I think Post-Nothing, we tracked in like, three days. And then I think maybe we had one more day for vocals. Jesse Gander, wonderful local recording engineer, he recorded it, he mixed it.

Jesse Gander: My name is Jesse Gander and I'm a recording engineer and producer in Vancouver, British Columbia. And yeah, I recorded most of the Japandroids records out there, including Celebration Rock. I first met Japandroids when they were a brand new band, they put on this show, just a DIY, punk rock show kind of thing. And I remember they played first and I thought they totally rocked. And I clearly remember it going through my head like, “Now this is totally like the kind of punk rock that I love but this is never gonna be popular with the kids (laughs). Like thinking like, like, in those days, everybody wanted to be like Joy Division, you know, it was all about, “How dark can you make it? How British can you be?” That's what was really popular in Canada at that time. So I remember thinking, “No one's gonna go for this, you know, Hüsker Dü barnburning punk rock, like I don't think anybody's ever gonna like this,” you know, just kind of a passing thought, but I really, really liked it. It was something that I immediately connected with and super loved the band right away. Yeah so then when they called me to start recording them, which I guess was for Post-Nothing. You know, it was a quick record, it was done in two days. I mean, I don't think they were thinking like, “Hey, let's drop umpteen $1,000 to make a big record that's going to you know, potentially change the course of our lives forever.” I don't think that's what they were thinking. They were a band that jammed a couple nights a week and played a few shows.

David Prowse: We had a very kind of interesting series of events leading to us playing a show to basically no one at a festival in Montreal called Pop Montreal. Later, we found out that a contributor to Pitchfork was at that show among the like 12 people there. We got a MySpace message, so this is really setting the place and time, we got a MySpace message in 2009 from Mark Richardson at Pitchfork and you could literally see as soon as he asked, “Can we put ‘Young Hearts Spark Fire’ on our website and we said, ‘Yeah, of course you can, please do. And then as soon as that happened, you know, just the amount of listeners on our MySpace page and followers and whatnot, just exponentially grew. And also, like, I think in 2022, it's hard for people to understand the sort of cachet and power that Pitchfork had in 2009. You know, they were definitely the kind of tastemaking website, you know, that existed in music and really could kind of like crown people. So that really kind of kicked things off in terms of just getting any recognition whatsoever.

Jesse Gander: Japandroids really weren't, to my perspective of it, weren't even really a popular local band yet. In Vancouver they were, like, I don't even think they were really quite at the size where they were headlining clubs in Vancouver yet. It would have been a shock to us all that, that people gravitated so much towards the record. And, and the press was so like, favorable to it. I think it was refreshing to people. And I think it was cool and it came up at a time that maybe people were ready for that.

Steven Hyden: They had that sort of loser allure that the Replacements had, you know, that these guys are not meant to be famous, really, they're not meant to be praised on Pitchfork, you know, they’re sort of like the last band, that you would expect to be getting good reviews from music critics. And yet, because they just have so much joy and celebration in the music, it just like won people over. And there’s something really appealing about that, you know, and it's hard to imagine that kind of record taking over the imagination of like the indie rock press today. You know, like a band that, isn't well connected, that isn't making what is considered, you know, sort of trendy music or forward thinking music. You know, really just sort of like an old school rock band made up of like, two misfits, you know, that somehow kind of takes over the world, or at least its corner of the world.

David Prowse: We had a very weird history of our band, where we kind of constantly felt like, the band was sort of on borrowed time, because we'd already given up on the band, and then all this stuff happened. And then we just kind of rolled with it and ended up touring on Post-Nothing for about a year and a half.

Jesse Gander: They were just such a hard working touring band, like they were just literally on tour all the time. And, you know, when you're a band like that, you really have to strike while the iron is hot, like when the tours are being offered to you and the press is being favorable to you and you have the energy and the will to tour lots and do that, you must.

David Prowse: There was a very weird feeling going into making Celebration Rock because, you know, we'd sort of given up on the band, then all the success had happened. And then, you know, we'd sort of just run ourselves into the ground, just saying yes to every opportunity we've been given as far as where to play and what to do. And then all of a sudden, it was time to make a new record.

I think when people listen to Celebration Rock, they think we were having a lot of fun in the studio and that is not really the case, there was occasionally moments where it was a good time, but I think actually, you know, strangely enough, it's a record that came out of a lot of anxiety and a lot of pressure, you know, self inflicted pressure.

Jesse Gander: They were basically like, you know, coming home for two weeks in between two month long tours, and try to write two songs, or one song or something like that, just try to have something, and a cover usually just for fun. And they were actually banging off what we kind of almost thought were going to be seven inches. So some of the songs of Celebration Rock, they were almost kind of one offs in a way. But as time went on, and the touring just didn't stop and they needed a new album a few years had passed now, like of them just touring non stop, and they were really like, probably also the record labels were like, “Yo, you guys need a proper full length, we can't just go on seven inches forever, we need an LP.”

David Prowse: It was pretty like serious business making the record and there was definitely a lot of moments where it felt like the record wasn't gonna get finished or there was definitely some moments where we felt pretty lost and unsure of what to do next. There was a pretty strong desire for both of us to prove that we weren't just some one hit wonder. So we definitely put a lot of pressure on ourselves and really pushed ourselves to try and make a record that we were really proud of and felt like a, you know, like a clear evolution from what we’d done previously.

Jesse Gander: I think Celebration Rock is a pretty massive step forward. And the songs as well, like the songs, lyrically are way more developed. Yeah, I think it is a massive step up and even though we did those, like Celebration Rock was also done in two days. It was done in two songs in two day chunks, not you know, ten songs in two days.

David Prowse: It was very, very different from Post-Nothing, Post-Nothing was pretty much like, you know, “Let's grab a case of beer and a case of Red Bull and go into the studio and just like (laughs) let it rip.” And there is a bit of that for Celebration Rock, but also a lot of moments where we would start doing things and then take a minute and be like, “Is this what we want to do?” And then you know, scrap a song or add a new song or et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So it's definitely a lot more labor intensive than Post-Nothing certainly was. And I think the biggest thing you notice is just that Brian is trying to say a lot more. You know, there were little hints of that, I think on Post-Nothing. But there were also a bunch of songs that had like two lines for the entire song.

Steven Hyden: So when Celebration Rock dropped, it was a real surprise, because not only was it a great record, but it came from this band that didn't seem to have the makings to produce an album like that, you know, it really was an example of them, not coming out of nowhere, but you know, really transforming themselves I think into something that felt really special. I think that was the double shock of that album, you know, just the fact that it was so good, and that Japandroids made it.

“The Nights of Wine and Roses”

David Prowse: So “The Nights of Wine and Roses” is one of the songs that took probably the longest to go from start to finish. For a long, long time, it was an instrumental that we really liked. And we had a nickname for it, we called it “Springsteen.” We called it “the Springsteen song” for a long time, I think, probably just because it was a bit slower than some of our other stuff, but felt very anthemic and kind of had like a, almost like a “Born in the USA” vibe or something like that to us. But as much as we loved the instrumental, we just couldn't really figure out how to turn it into, like a song, song. I actually was sort of in charge of writing the lyrics to that one for a long time and I just never really could come up with anything that felt quite right. And so when Brian took a crack at it, he basically had those lyrics down. And then the thing that really clinched that song to me is that sort of wordless bridge section, you know, because it's, “Yell like hell to the heavens!” And then, (sings) “Oh oh oh,” you know, that part comes in. And I feel like once that part of the song entered into it, it just took on a whole other life. And that's a really, really fun song to play live. And yeah, it was just definitely one of those eureka moments where as soon as Brian had that idea, that song just was like, “Oh, this is gonna be a good one, for sure. This is this is a banger to start the record with.”

Steven Hyden: “Nights of Wine and Roses” is just such a quintessential opening track. And I think it speaks to the rock scholarship of this band that, you know, if you're going to make a record like this, you need a “Thunder Road,” you need a “Black Dog,” you know, you need a sort of lapels grabbing opening track that's really going to set the tone. And you know, I love the, like the fireworks at the beginning of the song, you know, I feel like that's such a transformative moment. Putting the listener in a headspace where you're going back to a younger more innocent time in your life.

Jesse Gander: They’d just been touring the States I think and I don't know if you know, but in Canada, firecrackers are illegal, you cannot buy them here. You're not allowed to buy fucking gunpowder (laughs), like it's not like a thing you can just go and buy. And in Canada, you'd have to buy those on the black market usually. And people, like literally in high school, like delinquents would go across the border to Bellingham or Blaine or one of the close American border towns to Vancouver and buy the firecrackers and smuggle them back and sell them to the kids. And we’d like you know, blow shit up or put all the gunpowder into and put it all into one, you know, capsule, so it makes a bigger bang. Anyways so the guys had brought back a bunch of firecrackers, I'm not sure why.

David Prowse: So yeah, the fireworks. The fireworks are real. They're, I mean, it's firecrackers. Brian and I are both big fans of firecrackers. And we'd actually tried to record firecrackers in an earlier recording session for an EP like way back in the day. We often, especially back in those days, would have a pretty good cache of firecrackers on us whenever we go on tour. And America obviously is a land that loves their firecrackers, much more than Canada. So we would always hit up these like giant firecracker warehouses in like, especially in the Midwest, I feel like they have tons of those. So we just always had a cache of firecrackers. So we had that idea in the past and we wanted to do it again. So we did it just in the back parking lot, basically where you load into the studio. It's all concrete so there's a lot of like, interesting reflections and so Jesse just brought out a boom mic.

Jesse Gander: We blew up a whole pack of Mighty Mites, you know, or Boomers or one of those, you know, multiple packs of firecrackers that you light one and you know, 100 blow up. And we put mics outside and we mic'd that up. And it didn't really sound like much. So then I had the idea, “Let's just slow them right down,” like in Pro Tools, you can slow down the sound, and the pitch will also slow down. And when we slowed it right down and expanded the width of that track by, you know, 1,000% or something like that, all of a sudden, it just sounded like fireworks blowing off. And we're like, “Oh, my God is so cool.”

David Prowse: The real sound would have been more like, “pop pop pop pop pop pop.” But instead it's like, “pooom.” You know, it's just, that's just from the tape effect. It sounded pretty rad. It definitely came out better than I think any one of us thought it was gonna sound. So big credit to Jesse for making that sound as good as it did. It was sort of just a goofy idea that we had and then as soon as we heard it, we were like, “Oh, this is going to be great. We should definitely have the album start and finish with these.”

Steven Hyden: I think what Japandroids did, it's so simple, and so direct, that it's actually really hard to do, like the musicianship of it isn't complicated. The songwriting, you know, is pretty straightforward. So anyone can technically do it, you know, you can technically pull off the songs, any band could do that. But in terms of getting them over, performing them, selling them, it really does require I think, you know, a high level of commitment, and like a total lack of guile. You know, like, if you are singing a song like “Nights of Wine and Roses,” which is, you know, a song, it's like a drinking song, basically, it's a song, you know, “Let's stay up all night, and let's party.” If you do something like that and there's even a tinge of irony, or there's a tinge of self consciousness, or embarrassment, or, you know, sort of like a cool guy, posture with that, I think it just falls apart. You know, it points out the ridiculousness of a song like that. But if it's someone who is expressing something honest and true and emotional, it stops being ridiculous, and it becomes something that's almost like a memory. And really like for people who don't like this record, I think that's the thing that holds them back from it. Because you kinda have to be as guileless as Japandroids are, to get into this album, if you approach any of this stuff, cynically, the album falls apart, I think. And that's something that not every listener is going to be able to do to go all in in the same way that the band is.

“Fire’s Highway”

David Prowse: I think “Fire’s Highway” was actually the first song that we wrote for Celebration Rock that was finished. I mean, “Younger Us,” obviously, had come out before, well before that, but that song was, you know, initially was going to be a single and “Fire’s Highway” was written for the record and was done pretty early in the writing process, and was something that we were really, really happy with. Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great example of one of the things I like most about Brian's guitar playing, which is that, you know, being able to basically play chords underneath like a lead guitar line, you know, and I just love that way that Brian can play. And I think as soon as I heard that riff, I was pretty locked in. And that song felt like it came together pretty quickly and was a song we were really, really happy with. It was definitely one of those moments where once we had that song under our belts, I feel like we knew we were onto something, and it helped spur on the rest of the writing for this record.

Jesse Gander: I'm pretty sure that “Fire’s Highway” and I think “Evil’s Sway,” to me, those ones are kind of some of the most barnburner kind of songs on the record. Like “Fire’s Highway’s” a ripper of a song. I'm pretty sure that those were recorded in the summer. Like, I think that they had a very narrow window on tour. And it was like, again, this album was mixed in the winter. And I think those songs, like they're kind of fast like ripper songs, because I think they were just in that state of mind. They were just touring full blast. And I think “Fire’s Highway’s” probably kind of a reflection of that. Yeah, to me, that was always like, “This is a song inspired by being on tour endlessly.” And I think the narrative of the song probably captures a bit of that.

David Prowse: Post-Nothing, you know, a lot of the lyrical themes are pretty autobiographical, where it's, you know, about that feeling of being stuck and wanting to leave somewhere and, you know, Celebration Rock, you know, across the record, there's definitely a lot of stories about getting out and sort of all the different things you get up to once you're able to sort of escape your hometown and travel all over the world. And so “Fire’s Highway’s” a pretty great example of that, you know, it's definitely a road trip song. And yeah captures that kind of spirit of just like, wild nights on the road.

Steven Hyden: Yeah, I mean, to me, like “Fire’s Highway” is really plugging into that idea of like the open road and going out into the world. Which is like such a great like rock and roll subject, you know, because rock and roll is about transformation, you know, like changing your life for the better in breaking free of, you know, whatever was holding you back.

David Prowse: I think it's, in some ways, like one of the most emblematic songs for like the spirit of the record as a whole and even for the band as a whole, you know. I think a lot of people think of those kind of concepts, when they think of the band, they think of seizing the day and making the most of the time you have.

Steven Hyden: I mean, just the title, “Fire’s Highway.” I mean, again, it evokes things like “Thunder Road,” you know, like that sort of 50s, you know, youth exploitation type title, you know, like, you could imagine, like James Dean being in a movie called Fire’s Highway, you know, where he's playing like a bad boy, drag racer (laughs), you know, something like that. So, you know, I think with Japandroids, their lyrics are definitely, they’re heightened melodrama, you know, like, they're definitely writing in the same way that Springsteen did on Born to Run, where there are elements of autobiography, but it's heightened, you know, and it's cut through the language in the iconography of like old time, rock music. And it's, you know, acknowledging the cliches of that, but also celebrating it and realizing that you can utilize those cliches in the service of, you know, expressing something that's emotionally authentic.

“Evil’s Sway”

David Prowse: So “Evil Sway” is a weird one, we actually, for a long, long, long, long time, I think just because we recorded that song first. And when we record it, we were thinking it was gonna be a single, we were constantly thinking that was going to be the first single on the record, to the point where like, even when we sent in that finished album, and Polyvinyl first heard it, and, you know, our publicists first heard it, and like, you know, our manager and all these people, you know, we were like, “Oh, here's the record, ‘Evil’s Sway’ is going to be the first single. And, you know, we just had it so fixed in our mind. So eventually, you know, a bunch of people were like, “Hey, guys, there's this song called ‘House that Heaven Built,’ that I think you should probably make the single.” And obviously, we listened to them and it seems crazy now to think that we didn't think that “House that Heaven Built” was the single but just in our minds, we were just totally locked on “Evil’s Sway” being the single.

Again, like with lyrics, obviously, “Evil’s Sway,” there's a little bit of a nod to the Stones, you know. And then the other thing I always think about is, you know, he says, “All I see is sexual red,” which, like, every time I hear “sexual red,” I think of Gun Club, because that's, that's a line that Jeffrey Lee Pierce has. You know, our band is sort of this sweet spot where obviously, we really love these like, giant kind of populist anthems. You know, we love all those classic rock influences. As much as we love Gun Club and Dream Syndicate, we also, you know, love Bruce Springsteen, and Tom Petty. Brian definitely was like nodding to all these different influences, like throughout the record, you know. Just little moments here and there, these kind of little easter eggs.

Steven Hyden: I mean, I think the appeal of Celebration Rock is that these two guys had clearly studied rock history. And they were making an album in the mold of, you know, of a Born to Run or a Marquee Moon or a Led Zeppelin IV, it had the feeling of like a classic rock record, but like, they were not a classic rock band, you know, they're coming at it from a distance, in a way. They don't look like a typical rock band, you know, it's a guitar player and a drummer. They were clearly drawing from the continuum of rock music, but they were doing it in a way that really no other band had done, you know, and it was almost like, deconstructing what Classic Rock was and putting it together in like a slightly sort of eccentric shape that still delivered the goods, you know, in a way that you would want from a record like that.

David Prowse: Brian, especially, you know, in the kind of decade leading up to Celebration Rock, we were listening to a lot of the same music together, mainly because we’d hang out, we would be hanging out all the time. So Brian, especially is just like, just devours music constantly, and is just like ingesting it all and then and then sharing stuff with me. So he has like a pretty encyclopedic knowledge of of rock and roll.

You're talking to the drummer. So you know, one of the things I think about most with “Evil’s Sway” was that there was a drum solo. That was Brian's idea. You know, I came to drumming pretty late, and so I wasn't necessarily thinking that I had the skill set to provide a drum solo for a song, nor did we ever seem to be like the kind of band that would have a drum solo, but it was pretty fun to do and it's definitely a fun thing to do live.

“For the Love of Ivy”

Steven Hyden: It almost feels like a 50s record at times on the first side, it really feels like Japandroids kind of leaning into rock history in sort of like an old time rock and roll direction. And I think that's worth emphasizing, you know, I think that translates in like the sound of the songs, but also in the imagery. I mean, it just reminds me a lot of like, a lot of the sort of, like more, you know, doom and gloom type, early rock songs, it has like a slightly kind of gothic feel, to me a little bit on that side of the record, which I think is pretty cool.

David Prowse: We’d done a whole slew of singles between Post-Nothing and Celebration Rock. And with each one of those things, we do a b-side cover. And I think, usually, in the way we chose those, b-sides, we'd often be exploring darker material than we would sort of let ourselves write, you know, on our own. And I think it helped us broaden our horizons. So, you know, there's a Big Black cover that we did, we did a cover of “Jack the Ripper” by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. We covered PJ Harvey, we covered X. And so that Gun Club cover was originally you know, planned is one of those b-sides,

Jesse Gander: We'd kind of not had a great weekend. Like, I think we'd had a weekend where the original song they'd written hadn't gone down quite as well as they'd hoped. I think Brian was starting to doubt the quality of the song, which again, I think got rewritten and re-recorded and included on Celebration Rock in the end. But meanwhile, we kind of got to the end of the weekend, and we were like, “Fuck, you know, we kind of didn't meet our goals this weekend, or we weren't really happy with what we'd done.” And I think we were probably drinking at the time or, I mean, I don't think I was but I’m pretty sure they were. I normally don't drink much at work. But I think it was kind of like we were feeling bummed. And we're like, “Let's just do something fun. Let's do something exciting.” So I had the idea of being like, “Let's just create a crazy vocal sound.” It's not an easy song to sing either. Because you know, you have to do your best Jeffrey Lee Pierce and he's a pretty fucking crazy guy and whatever. So I think what I did is I hooked up the vocals and I ran them through some different like distorted like tube mic pre’s, and I ran them through the Space Echo and I literally like came up with a vocal sound that was totally mixed. And I think I think Brian had had a few at that moment in time and was probably getting tired already. And it was like, “Just like go in there and fucking bang something out, just like go in there and rip a song off. Let's not punch in, let's not get granular, let's not get in our heads about it. Let's just like go in have some fun and crank it out.”

David Prowse: I remember distinctly Jesse just handing Brian a bottle of Jack Daniels and like a 58, just like a cordless 58, and turning the lights out in the main tracking room and just being like, “Take a few pulls off the Jack Daniels and just let it rip.” And that's that's how we got the vocal for that. I would definitely not recommend that as the way to get all your vocals for a record but it did definitely work for that one

Jesse Gander: And he did that vocal for “For the Love of Ivy,” which I think he did a great job on and it's totally exciting. And then it was like, “Okay, we're done. You know, this weekend was a bit shit, but we got one rad thing out of it.”

David Prowse: You know, I think one of Jesse's big strong suits for us is that he's quite a talented singer, and he's a really great coach for vocals. And you know, I think one of the things that I really notice, especially listening back to Celebration Rock is just remembering like Brian was not a confident singer at that time. You know, he's gotten a lot more confident as a lyricist and singer as as the band's gone on, but you know, when we first started vocals was not a source of confidence and Jesse really knew how to bring the best out of Brian vocally and some of the performances he got out of Brian on Celebration Rock are pretty incredible.

That was a really fun cover to record. And it also became like a live set staple for us after that. So obviously, our band really loves dynamics, like we like, you know, being super loud and then trying to stop for a minute, or bring things down for a second then explode again. And The Gun Club are so good at that.

Steven Hyden: You know, to cover a Gun Club song in 2012, that just was not something that I think a lot of indie groups were interested in in 2012. That was just like a reference that, like a lot of things on this record, it was sort of like a passe thing, you know, to sound like that. And again, I think it just speaks to how isolated this band was, how they were not part of any kind of scene, and it didn't seem like they wanted to fit in. When you think about indie rock, as it was in 2012. It was an interesting year because there was a transition going on, I think, from what was going on in the late aughts, which was a very arty type of indie rock that was coming out of Brooklyn, you know, exemplified by groups like Animal Collective and Grizzly Bear and Dirty Projectors, who were drawing from folk music, but also like a lot of like pop and R&B and dance music, really, like not much of a rock thing going on at all. So when you listen to this record in that context, and you remember, like, what else was going on, I think it stands out even more.

David Prowse: Honestly, that song sticks out like a sore thumb on the record, to me, and to Brian to I think that is one weird thing about the record that actually irks us. Not that we, you know, we love that song and we love The Gun Club, but I think if we could do it all over again, we’d probably try and stick one more original that felt like it fit with the rest of the record a little better. There was a lot of ways to sort of talk ourselves into including it on the album, especially when you had seven songs, and you really wanted to have an eight song album. But it's a weird one to listen back to because it kind of feels like it sort of belongs in a different world.

Jesse Gander: Yeah, obviously, like putting a cover on a record, I get why the band regrets that. And like I said, there was, you know, this was like a situation where like, “We have to go back on tour, like in a week from now, like we have to wrap this up, we need a song.” And it's a good thing that it was pretty rad because it ended up being needed to make an eight song record. Otherwise, we would have had a seven song record.

Steven Hyden: Well it’s interesting to me because I feel like the record is somewhat back loaded. You know, the first side in a way feels like the opening act. And the second side is like the headliner.

“Adrenaline Nightshift”

David Prowse: So “Adrenaline Nightshift” is one of my favorite songs that we've ever done. And it was often a set opener on the whole Celebration Rock tour. It’s got a bit of a like a “Born to Run” kind of vibe or something where you're really like coming in all guns blazing. And it felt like a great way to start either side A or side B of the record. And I think when we were messing around with track listings, that was one of the things to me that kind of kept bouncing around was you know, there was a moment of thinking “Adrenaline Nightshift” would start the record. But if it didn't start the record, it should at least start side B. Yeah, again, it's another autobiographical kind of song. And it's has a real Replacements vibe to me, you know, like it's a pretty messy, drunken anthem, you know, like there's a real hook to it. But it's also like, kind of sloppy, and kind of falling apart at the edges. And I just, I feel like that's a pretty sweet spot for us to hit. About halfway through making this record, we started recording some songs to a click track. And part of that came from a debate we had about “Adrenaline Nightshift” where we, you know, had done a bunch of takes, and got this tape that we were like, “Oh, this is sweet. This, this sounds great. We played really well.” We're like, “Oh, this is feeling really good, blah, blah.” You know, we'd record together, obviously, guitars and drums at the same time, and then Brian would sing over it, on top of the instrumental track. As soon as Brian tried to sing over it, he was like, “Whoa, this is way too fast. We've recorded this way too fast.” And Jesse and I were like, “Nah, man, it's good. It's good. It's good. It's got this whole ‘Born to Run’ kind of energy. It's great, man. This is perfect.” And he was like, “This is not ‘Born to Run,’ this is so fast.” And I remember, we listened to “Adrenaline” and then we listened to “Born to Run” and we realized, “Oh yeah, this is like twice as fast as ‘Born to Run’ (laughs). There's another “Born to Run” about this at all.

Steven Hyden: When I listen to this record, I hear a band that is trying to sit next to their heroes. Like it is really just, you know them making their version of Born to Run as if that's the most natural thing to do in 2012, as if that's something that everybody would be doing, which of course, it's not, you know. But their spirit of that and like their directness with that, I think is what really sells the record, you know, to people who love it.

“Younger Us”

Steven Hyden: I would just go back again to really kind of replugging into a version of yourself that doesn't exist anymore. And sometimes the only way to revisit that is through a record. And I think the song “Younger Us,” like, specifically, it's about pining for that, like literally in the lyrics. But again, I think what makes that song come across, is the sound of it. You know, it sounds like a rush of nostalgia or sentimentality, how ever you want to describe it. But the way that that song feels, I think it matters more even than like, what's in the lyrics. And I think that's true of Japandroid songs, in general, that they have a way of plugging into something. You know, like, when you hear it, you remember the times in your life, when that was your life, you know, when you were young, and you were staying up all night for the first time, and you were with your friends, and it was something that felt really exhilarating, and innocent. And those kinds of memories, they're easy to scoff at when you get older, and you're more cynical, and you feel like you've matured or that you're smarter than you used to be. But I think the great thing about Japandroids is that it really is about the most innocent and maybe the dumbest part of your life. And there's no distance from it at all.

David Prowse: So “Younger Us” was actually yeah, it was a non album single. It came out in spring of 2010. And that song came together very quickly. Brian had been writing it while we're on tour, but I didn't really even hear it until a day or two before we cut it. Brian and I jammed it for like three days or something.

Jesse Gander: That was my favorite Japandroids song when they brought it to me. At the time, I'm almost certain that was the first song, post-Post-Nothing that I recorded. And I remember thinking, “That's the best song you ever wrote, like, that's way better to me than anything on Post-Nothing. And that's not to slight Post-Nothing. I like songs on that record, too. But “Younger Us,” to me is a song, I think very few songs I've ever recorded, kind of embody the spirit of how it feels to kind of be young and be out at night and kind of, you know, having personal freedom and falling in love and like everything that could possibly be good about being young, that song is so much about. I love it.

David Prowse: Yeah, I think it inadvertently really showed us a way of growing and seemed to be kind of a pretty natural next step forward where we're sort of still writing like big anthemic songs. But, you know, I think we were a bit more confident as musicians, I think Brian was becoming a more confident vocalist, I think we're really kind of crystallizing some of those things that kind of were our strong suits, you know, like those big vocals, you know, a gnarly guitar sound, but also like, very, very melodic guitar playing. And then those dynamics of sort of, you know, coming in with a little bit of a quieter verse, and then exploding into the next part. And you know, Brian singing in that kind of lower octave, and then go into that high octave after that.

We were like 26, writing a song called “Younger Us,” which now that I’m almost 40, seems ridiculous (laughs). But yeah, you know, it's funny, right? I mean, I think that's a funny thing about being younger, I think, is that you can also sometimes, like, have this idea that you're so world weary without really realizing how silly that might sound to an outsider. You know, and I think a lot of people can relate to that, too. It's just that feeling of feeling a lot older than your years sometimes.

Steven Hyden: You know, an underrated aspect of this album, is the romance of it. I think there's a certain softness and vulnerability to it. And I don't think that like, you know, looking back on your childhood, is exclusive to any one demographic. I mean, I think anyone has a certain sentimentality about their past. I think people tend to classify it as like a dudes rock type album. And, you know, there's certainly elements of that on the record, but you know, I always feel like that's kind of like a reductive way to dismiss something, you know, that it's just like a bunch of dudes drinking beer and playing loud guitars. And, you know, isn't that special that that's happening. I know quite a few women who like this record, because I don't really think of it as like, like a macho record.

David Prowse: We've managed to find that line where it's sort of music for a while bros night out, but it's also not in a sort of super toxic way (laughs). It's actually just like, music for nice dudes to have nice times (laughs). I remember somebody telling me, they've never seen so many guys like hugging each other as at a Japandroids show, you know, like it's a, there's a sort of warmth I think to a lot of the writing. You know, there's an element of like, having a wild night out but there's there's also kind of a, you know, a pretty strong like heart behind it.

“The House That Heaven Built”

Steven Hyden: A song like, you know, “House That Heaven Built,” what strikes me about that song is the softness of it, you know, the softness at the core of that song, you know. It's expressing something, you know, so heartfelt. You know, it really is a song that describes the kind of love that you feel when you're 21.

David Prowse: I think it's pretty clear at this point that if there's one song that anybody is ever going to know, Japandroids for it's going to be “House That Heaven Built.” Brian and I talked a lot about how, after Post-Nothing, Brian, felt a lot of pressure, where he was like, “Man, I don't know if I'm ever gonna write another song. That people connect with this as much as ‘Young Hearts Spark Fire.’ Like, I think that might just be the one if we make ten more albums, that'll be the song everybody wants to hear.” “House That Heaven Built” obviously, is definitely eclipsed that in terms of, you know, just how far it's traveled, and how many people have heard it. That was one of the ones that came from the trip to Nashville.

Jesse Gander: They rented a house for a month, and just jammed, like they just needed to get away, like, no friends, no hanging out, like, “We just have to, like write the last four songs on this record. Because if we don't do it when we're away, we're not going to have the time to do it.” And that's when they wrote, well, in particular, “The House That Heaven Built” was written down there.

David Prowse: You know, we kind of hit a point where things weren't really feeling like they were happening in Vancouver. So a change of scenery just felt like a really good way to just force ourselves to write and focus. So we ended up writing “Continuous Thunder” and “The House That Heaven Built” in Nashville. And we have some very, somewhere, I'm sure, I have some very funny phone recordings of like, original demos of that, from that house in Nashville.

Jesse Gander: And I got to hear the demos from it. They sent me an email with, you know, whatever, a phone recording or something. Yeah and I heard that song and was like, “Oh, you've written the hit. Good job (laughs).” Sounds great. So yeah, I was pretty confident about that one at the time.

David Prowse: We didn't think about key back then. So we'd write a song instrumentally, just based on where it sounded best on a guitar. So occasionally, that creates some problems, because all of a sudden, he realizes like, “Oh shit, I can't actually sing these notes where they're supposed to be.” And you know, we just got like, so profoundly lucky with “The House That Heaven Built,” where it's just right at the tippy top of his range, and he can just barely hit it.

Jesse Gander: That was one of the last overdubs we did. We tried, like, slowing it down, we tried like lowering the pitch, like it's right on the cusp of it. And we tried recording it so many different ways to get it to feel as bright and anthemic and exciting as possible. It's actually like an old, it's a Daniel Lanois trick. He's a Canadian producer who produced, like U2, U2’s biggest records, like I'm pretty sure he did The Joshua Tree. And that was, like, one of the tricks was like, adjust the song’s pitch to be as high as it could possibly be, but not too high. “So that way, Bono is always soaring,” you know. And although like, I don't know if Japandroids are quite as soaring as U2 gets. They're soaring in a fast, more bombastic way.

David Prowse: There's a certain emotional factor that you can only get, I think, when it sounds like he's actually like, struggling to hit those notes. You know, there's something about that, that really brings out this like, desperation and like, it really helps that feeling of urgency really come out. You know, so to some extent, that was like sheer dumb luck. And that's just where the song was written. But I think there's also this element of like, “No, like, you can hit those notes. It's going to be a struggle, but like, you can hit those notes and when you do, it's going to be really special.” You know, made it a bitch to play on live, though, for sure. Because, you know, it's hard for him to hit those notes night after night (laughs).

Yeah, obviously, a calling card for our band is the big backup vocals and all the gang vocals. So for almost every song, I think this one was one that we really wanted to dial in and make sure that we really nailed it. Because we could really tell like this is going to be something people are going to want to sing along to. I think, you know, I think this and then obviously that bridge in “Nights of Wine and Roses” are sort of two big moments where you really want the crowd to know they're supposed to sing there. So, once we started touring on Post-Nothing, I think we really noticed those moments where people wanted to sing along. And so I think there was definitely a bit more of a conscious effort for this record of being like, “Okay, let's figure out a way to get the crowd to sing along to this part, how do we get the crowd to sing along to this part?” And there's definitely a lot more of those very clear kind of cues that we did. One of the real, like, producer moments for Jesse, is on that song. So, you know, when he sings, “You're not mine to die for anymore so I must live.” You know, that's when the vocal should come back in and Jesse was like, “No, dude, we don't have it there. We just let that space be there to give the chance for the crowd to sing it whenever you guys play it live.” And I really liked that sense of space there. I think it's really cool. And it just makes the song explode that last time.

The crowd is sort of this really important part of our show, you know, like, it’s very participatory, right? Like, we're not looking to do a thing where everybody in the crowd is supposed to, like, sit down and watch us perform a show for them. It's very much like a communal thing that we're all a part of, you know, and we really wanted to like, integrate that and kind of bring that into this next record to really kind of keep building on that. So yeah, having all those big gang vocals was a huge part of creating that sort of an atmosphere.

Steven Hyden: One of the really fun things about Celebration Rock is that it does feel like hanging out with your friends. There's so many bands, you know, so many great bands, where you feel like the band members don't hang out, you know, like when they're not playing together. But with Japandroids, you do feel like, “Oh, that these two are like best friends. And they're having a great time. And they're inviting you as the listener to, you know, be the third wheel.” They’re like, “Hey, man, hang out with us, we're gonna have a great time. And, you know, you might be alone right now listening to this. But if you put this record on, you're not going to be alone, we're going to be with you for the next 40 minutes. And it's gonna be a great time.” And like all the great rock records, it is like a companion. You know, you feel like, “I'm hanging out with these guys. And they understand me in a way that maybe other people don't like and act a certain way when I'm listening to this, that maybe I can't act when I'm with other people.” And that's, I think, one of the magical things about Celebration Rock.

David Prowse: I certainly didn't have any insight nor did Brian that this song was going to be the sort of life changing song for us. You're just making every song as good as it can be. And you're just hoping, you know, you're hoping people like it, but most of all, you're hoping that you like it. And you know with that song, we just made a song that we were really proud of. But we didn't have any, any idea of how much it was going to change our lives.

Jesse Gander: It got bigger and bigger and bigger after that moment in time. And you know, nothing is bigger, nothing is more popular in Vancouver than hockey. You know, it's like Canadians love hockey, and the Vancouver Canucks, you know, you don't even have to be into hockey, you still watch, you know, the Canucks, you watch the playoffs. And yeah, like, they would skate out onto the rink, to “House That Heaven Built” in Vancouver and it was getting played at the stadium every single week as the local hockey team skated onto the ice. And I know Brian was quite proud because he bought tickets to the hockey game and he brought his mom who's a Vancouverite and he brought her to the game and she got to hear his song while the team skated on the ice. She's also a big sports fan from my understanding as well so I think it's quite was quite a “Look mom, I made it!” moment when the local hockey team is skating to your song onto the ice so that was a pretty big deal.

David Prowse: It's wild, you know, to see everybody singing along to your music and that's the one that just gets obviously the wildest response from a crowd and that never gets old. I'm never gonna get tired of that ever.

“Continuous Thunder”

Jesse Gander: I was excited when I heard this song because you can be the, you could try to be the fastest band and bands have done that and you can try to be, you know, the hookiest, poppiest kind of band or whatever. But, you know, if you can't do a slow one, you know what I mean? Like everybody likes a slow one.

Steven Hyden: I think in the same way that like “Nights of Wine and Roses” is just a prototypical first track, I think “Continuous Thunder” is a prototypical closer. You know, it is a little more subdued in terms of it's not as upbeat as a lot of the songs on the record. It is more introspective, it's slower, I guess you could describe it as a ballad, but it really does feel like a summation type song, you know? Like, this is what's playing over the closing credits as like the couple kisses under a thunderstorm.

David Prowse: We started falling into a bit of a pattern of like seven fast songs one slow song at the end. So “Continuous Thunder” kind of takes in some of that same space that “I Quit Girls” had on Post-Nothing to some extent in the sense that it's, you know, it is slower and it's a little bit more subdued than everything else.

Jesse Gander: So yeah, writing that song, I was like, “Oh, man,” like, I just think it really shows a lot of skill as a songwriter, as a singer, as a drummer, as well. I've talked a lot about Brian, I haven't talked as much about Dave. Like to play a slow, spacious, pocketed drum song amongst a song like “Younger Us” that's going 250 BPM or whatever it is, it shows your diversity as a band. And to me, it also shows the longevity of the band.

David Prowse: I was very proud of that song when we finished it, you know, not just as a drummer, but I think I was also just proud of our band, because it felt like we were really exploring some new territory with that. Whereas, you know, a lot of these songs on Celebration Rock felt like kind of, almost like writing like a better version of “Young Hearts Spark Fire” or “Wet Hair” or something like that. Like it's kind of in our wheelhouse, but trying to execute that idea better. “Continuous Thunder” felt a bit more like an exploration of something a little different.

Yeah, again, we were yet exploring a pretty different way of being a band for that song. And you know, and a huge part of that, obviously, is the way Brian sings. So, you know, whereas every other song, Brian's kind of just yelling at the top of his lungs, and that's sort of where that emotional resonance comes from. You know, this one was much, much more intimate, you know. So yeah, so there's a different choice of microphone, there was definitely a different kind of balance in his headphones. He wasn't playing his playback at the top volume, so that he had to yell to get over it, it was quieter, everything about it was just approached with a lot more subtlety. And our band is not known for subtlety. So it was definitely a different approach.

Jesse Gander: This was actually recorded similar to “For the Love of Ivy,” where I came up with a vocal sound first. I didn't make Brian record all, you know, clean and vulnerable and kind of like dry and exposed. I made him comfortable first. I came up with that kind of saturated, blown out sound that he often would use on all those earlier records. Like we'd use the sans amp, like for his vocals and stuff like that, that's sort of like a guitar amp simulator. So that way, Brian wouldn't feel like himself singing it, he'd feel like he was in the character of the song. And that's a trick I've found over the years. Like, if I give him a good headphone mix, where he feels cool, then he sings really cool, too.

David Prowse: And I don't really remember it being that much of a struggle, honestly, to get that vocal performance, I think Brian had a pretty clear idea of what he wanted to do. I think there is, you know, a fair amount of effects on the vocal just so it doesn't feel too too exposed and finding the right blend where it, you know, sits in the mix. So it's not kind of overly vulnerable was a thing. But I think as far as how to sing to that song, I think it was pretty clear that that was the way to sing.

Steven Hyden: It doesn't have the grandiosity of a song like “Jungleland,” but it has a similar sort of feeling of being an elegy, you know, like, “Okay, we've gone on this journey together. And we were these young kids at the beginning of the record. And now we're at the end, and we've changed a little bit, maybe we've grown up over the course of this journey.” And with “Continuous Thunder,” it's almost like, “Okay, the heroes are walking off into the sunset, but they're not going to be the same people maybe that they were at the beginning of the record.”

David Prowse: I think the real moment when I realized certainly that things were totally changing was, we went in May, and we did a UK tour right before the album was about to drop. And it was really fun, but it was kind of like playing a lot of the same type of venues we've been playing on Post-Nothing, you know, small clubs, really great crowds, blah, blah, blah. And then we went right from that to a big North American tour. And I think the first show of that North American tour was in Seattle at Neumos and it was sold the fuck out, like so sold out, like so many people. And basically, every show on that tour was like that. It was just like, fucking rammed with people. And people already knew, you know, like all the new songs, even though the album had just dropped. And that's when it was like, “Okay, this is something totally different is about to happen here.” It's not really until you are playing in front of people that you really see kind of how much of a whole the album already has on people. And it was definitely like that first tour of North America was just like, “Oh, wow, this is this is a big deal. People are really excited and this is going to change our lives.”

Jesse Gander: I think when you capture a kind of a band at a time when they're playing live an incredible amount. They were touring like, like they toured for two and a half years straight, they did like 4,000 shows or something like that, they played in 70 countries, or something obscene like that. To capture that energy, like you can sit around in your house and write great songs and people do. And you have to do that at a certain time as a songwriter. But those songs were written on tour in a completely whirlwind time in their lives. And there's a bit of kind of like, you know, divine intervention that creates this energy of that time and this momentum that they were able to capture, and I was lucky enough to get to record.

David Prowse: Celebration Rock, I think we had a pretty clear idea of how we could improve on what we did with Post-Nothing. And then I think after Celebration Rock, you know, that path became a little less clear to us, you know, I think, obviously, there's only the two of us in the band. So your options, as far as like, where you can go musically are more limited. And so, yeah, I think it's no surprise that it took quite a long time to make the next record, partly because we toured our asses off and we were gone for like two years, touring on Celebration Rock, and then we were exhausted after that. But I think also, you know, the shadow of Celebration Rock looms pretty large over our band, you know, for, you know, mostly for good. But the flip side of that is, yeah, like, there's definitely moments where, you know, on Near To The Wild Heart Of Life for us where we were, we will be working on a song and we'd be like, “Maybe this sounds a little too much like Japandroids” (laughs). You know, and that wasn't something that ever occurred to us on Celebration Rock, but it is a funny thing, where it's not necessarily just about Celebration Rock itself, but as your band progresses, and as you keep going, like I think there's, there's a certain need to feel like you're challenging yourself and exploring new territory. So it's an interesting thing, right? Where there's probably a whole bunch of people that would just want Celebration Rock Part Two, and then Celebration Rock Part Three, Part Four, and so on and so forth. But that wasn't necessarily something we were interested in doing.

Steven Hyden: You know, the problem with Japandroids is that when you make a record that recreates the feeling of falling in love for the first time, you know, you can only fall in love for the first time once you know. So if that's what people want from you, you know, how do you do that on your next record? I think that's really hard to do. I think it remains to be seen with Japandroids because they haven't put out a whole lot of music since Celebration Rock, you know, like, I'd be hard pressed to say they're never gonna make a record as good as that because they've only made one record since then. I do know that if they don't make another record at all, or they don't make a record as good as Celebration Rock that I don't think it really matters. You know, Celebration Rock, to me is like one of those albums that you can't replicate. They made this record. And you can't take that away from them. And maybe that's enough.

Jesse Gander: You're not going to write Celebration Rock twice and not like we're even trying to or that Japandroids are trying to do that, necessarily, but we always think about Celebration Rock we always think about, you know, what makes that record great. We always consider it, we listen to it, sometimes in the studio, we think about it, at least I do. But that song shows that it's not a one trick pony band. Like Japandroids do slower, weirder, moodier shit. And they've written a lot of stuff since then where they've done that, and I think that “Continuous Thunder” makes that kind of, okay, you know, like, it’s not really out of their wheelhouse. And for sure, like, Near To The Wild Heart Of Life goes farther away from that at times, and also set them up for the fact that Japandroids have been a band for 10 more years since Celebration Rock and are still touring and have written tons of new songs, which are not out yet but will exist one day, and yeah, they're still a relevant band. So that that song to me is the gateway to the rest of their career.

David Prowse: I think the overwhelming feeling I have when I look back on this record is just gratitude. You know, I can still remember being the dude who was just playing drums in a local Vancouver band and wondering if I was ever going to, you know, get to go on a proper tour. And if anybody outside of Vancouver was ever going to really hear our songs. I have a lot of friends who are amazingly talented musicians and who have made fantastic albums. And, you know, their work hasn't been recognized in the same way on the same level. And as much as I think we're a good band and like our songs very much and I think we put on a good show. I'm also acutely aware of how much luck and timing is a factor in success, you know, and overall, I just feel so lucky you know that I got to make a record that I'm really proud of that means so much to people. It’s a pretty amazing thing to be part of.

Outro:

Dan Nordheim: Visit lifeoftherecord.com for more information about Japandroids. You’ll also find a link to stream or purchase Celebration Rock. Thanks for listening.

Album Credits:

Japandroids is Brian King (guitar/vocals) and David Prowse (drums/vocals)

All songs written by Japandroids except “For the Love of Ivy” by The Gun Club

"The Nights of Wine and Roses" (Brian King)

"Fire's Highway" (Brian King)

"Evil's Sway" (Brian King)

"For the Love of Ivy" (Jeffrey Lee Pierce, Kid Congo Powers)

"Adrenaline Nightshift" (Brian King)

"Younger Us" (Brian King)

"The House That Heaven Built" (Brian King)

"Continuous Thunder" (Brian King)

Recorded and Mixed by Jesse Gander at The Hive Creative Labs in Vancouver, BC, Canada sporadically throughout 2010/2011

Mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side Music

Produced by Jesse Gander and Japandroids

Episode Credits:

Theme Music:

“Winter Cold” by North Home

Intro/Outro Music:

“Lost” by Two Houses from the album, Can’t Fail

Episode produced, edited and mixed by Dan Nordheim

Additional mixing and mastering by Jeremy Whitwam