| Jimmy Lavalle is yawning. He’s calling from a cell phone in Lawrence, Kansas – hardly a hotbed of metropolitan excitement – a few hours ahead of his next show in support of the Album Leaf’s latest album, In a Safe Place. He’s been working the press for a while now and even the news that indie heavyweight www.pitchforkmedia.com has deemed his album a worthy addition to your record collection has him nonplussed.
"Yeah, my manager told me (the album got a 7.9). It doesn’t really matter to me," Lavalle says, and yawns again.
Given the buzz surrounding his latest effort, his disinterest is somewhat surprising. Recorded in Iceland, the album is being touted as the Album Leaf’s best so far. It continues down the atmospheric, introspective path Lavalle set out on in 1999 with the release of his debut album, An Orchestrated Rise to Fall, which garnered enough attention for the discerning Tigerstyle record label to put out his second album, One Day I’ll Be on Time in 2001.
Now, Lavalle (also a member of the Black Heart Procession and Tristeza) calls Sub Pop Records home. Perhaps the best example of just how far the Seattle-based label has divested itself of its infamous grungy past, In a Safe Place is a quiet, heartfelt and epic album in which Lavalle charts a clear path of largely instrumental songs that resemble film scores as much as pop music. This latest album is leaps ahead of the art-damaged ambience of his early work, demarcated most noticeably by the inclusion of vocals.
"I write in a verse-chorus, verse-chorus kind of way. It’s just been instrumental (on previous albums). Melody is really important to me," says Lavalle. "It’s something I’ve always tried to do. That’s what my vocal is: I try to create the melody as what the ear would catch on the vocal. That’s my whole approach to it."
While In a Safe Place is undeniably replete with hooks, it is hardly a lighthearted affair and the weight of the album should come as no surprise. Lavalle has spent considerable time touring with musical geniuses du jour Sigur Ros, and the album was recorded in Iceland after Lavalle finally acquiesced to Jon Thor Birgisson and company’s persistent pleading that he come to their homeland to make his next album. There is clearly a shared tone between the two bands, especially on the track "Over the Pond," which features Birgisson on vocals.
The collaboration, however, has resulted in Lavalle having to transcend uninformed reviews that lump him in with the groundswell of Sigur Ros mimics, while maintaining his own identity in interviews and with a curious public.
"Personally, I’m just a little tired of being asked about Sigur Ros, Sigur Ros, Sigur Ros," Lavalle says wearily. "But it’s part of the record – that’s just my little thing. It’s still an Album Leaf record from front to back. It’s still, like, what you could expect from me in the first place. But everyone is going on, ‘It was recorded in Iceland,’ and they’re right – it probably wouldn’t sound that way if it was recorded in another place. But (if it was recorded elsewhere) we’d probably do the same songs and it would just feel different, you know?" Lavalle punctuates his obvious boredom with the subject with another yawn.
"Personally I don’t even think I sound like Sigur Ros. Period. You know, if you think about what they actually are, I don’t think that what I do sounds anything like them. Personally, I think if I was referred to as that, I would say that I sound more like (Icelandic band) Mum than I sound like Sigur Ros."
While he might come across as a little defensive, his soft-spoken manner belies any animosity. The frustration is understandable – even with a cursory listen, The Album Leaf is not Sigur Ros. And while Lavalle is resigned to the fact that the comparisons will likely dog him until his next Sigur Ros-free album, he seems content with the fact that the collaboration has got his music into more hands, and the surrounding buzz has attracted larger audiences.
"If it helps the album get out there, if people need to hang on to that, it’s OK," Lavalle says, chuckling. "Everyone gotta compare it with everything, and I guess it’ll help sales, which is cool." And he yawns again. |
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