The New Pornographers - Continue as a Guest
Merge Records
Released March 31st, 2023
It’s not clear if The New Pornographers were intentional in timing their latest release to coincide with the shifting of seasons, or if it’s just a happy accident, but Continue as a Guest feels like the perfect companion for the in-between realities of spring. Out March 31, the newest offering from the (oft-dubbed) supergroup is an experience like stepping out into the morning to discover winter is over - things are still a little foggy but you start to remember there’s more to life than stillness and snow. Here is something vibrant, familiar but forgotten. Continue as a Guest feels plain nice - despite the limitations of that adjective - offering a sense of comforting simplicity that belies its subtle complexity. On the surface, Continue as a Guest doesn’t hit you with the same big immediacy of some of The New Pornographers’ previous offerings, but its charm and allure rests in that understated complexity. Every listen finds you exploring undiscovered garden paths you didn’t notice the last time around.
Album opener “Really Really Light” carries you into a spacious, welcoming place, and once the hooks are in, you’re fully along for the rest of the ride. Each three-to-four minute bend in the road offers a new perspective, at turns wistful, driving, fun, contemplative, political, and sensual. Fans of The New Pornographers will find solace in Continue’s pop-tinged indie hooks and the familiar vocal prominence of AC Newman, Neko Case, and Kathryn Calder, who take turns swapping lead and backing roles. Chunky and clipped guitar/bass pairings drive the hooks home at a steady simmer, while jangly backing guitars and subtle keys add layers of pop rock finesse. Saxophonist Zach Djanikian adds a very lovely sultry atmosphere on several tracks. The album is not a major departure from The New Pornographers’ signature sound, but instead has a sense of maturation and settling into the quintessence of what that sound is. The result is a record that both deepens and elevates the magical tones that listeners have fallen in love with for years. Although each of the six core members are independently brilliant, as a unit the New Pornographers continue to prove the maxim that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Written primarily by Newman (with additional co-writing credits to Dan Bejar and Sadie Dupuis on tracks 1 and 9 respectively) during the COVID-19 pandemic, Continue as a Guest explores the ambivalent nature of existence in these strange times: “I was trying to capture a feeling of being stuck, but you don’t mind being stuck. You’re not sure what to call this life you’re leading. Are you happy? You might be. There should be a word for this.” Something like a spring afternoon? Things might be crumbling around us, but the days are a little longer, and maybe that’s enough.
- Chris Lammiman
