Life After Death By Hype? This is Clap Your Hands Say Yeah in 2014.
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Few indie musicians understand hype's immense push-and-pull better than Mt. Airy native Alec Ounsworth of the band Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (typically, and understandably, abbreviated as CYHSY).
Tastes change.
The media changes.
The culture changes.
But one question remains fixed at the pedagogical center of music criticism: Is hype a good thing?
Few indie musicians understand hype’s immense push-and-pull better than Mt. Airy native Alec Ounsworth of the band Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (typically, and understandably, abbreviated as CYHSY).
Ever since CYHSY’s self-titled debut galvanized MP3 bloggers and earned a coveted 9.0/10.0 review from Pitchfork nearly a decade ago, the band has ridden a convoluted fame cycle involving backlash against 2007’s Some Loud Thunder, damning comparisons to acts who have creatively lapped them and a never-ending slew of retrospective pieces detailing what such a trajectory means. The 36-year-old Ounsworth and a new set of bandmates are now touring behind Only Run, self-released earlier this month, and seeing a familiar process swinging back around.
Grantland’s Steven Hyden, in an otherwise balanced piece citing CYHSY as the definitive “blog rock” act of the mid-2000s, recalled the band’s gig opening for a then-struggling The National back in the day: “As it turned out, the National became the National, while Clap Your Hands Say Yeah still sounds like a decent opening act from 2005.” Ouch.
Ounsworth, for his part, is over all this talk about his trajectory. “I’m a bit tired of that. I had nothing to do with the ‘blog rock’ nonsense when I started, and I have nothing to do with it now,” he explains over a crackling phone line from a gas station somewhere in the Midwest. His speaking voice, low and lackadaisical, shatters the image of a whiny and fragile man-child that his nasal tenor singing voice conjures in many listeners. (His penchant for wearing fedoras during the debut album’s tour cycle probably didn’t help.) “As someone who didn’t pay a lot of attention to blogs in the past, to withstand that association yet again and have it creep into evaluations of material. … It’s fascinating, and a little pathetic.”
Refutation of hype is nothing new, but one gets a sense that breaking from his perceived legacy is crucial for Ounsworth’s creative survival. Only Run is a marked departure from the band’s previous work, more atmospheric and ominous thanks to heavy synths and subdued, synthetic rhythms. Some of the old hallmarks are still there — chirpy keys and bright guitars abound on the dancey “Little Moments” and the propulsive “Beyond Illusion” — but they’re removed from the center and stretched out over wandering and fuzz-driven mini-epics that compel foot-tapping and glaze-eyed submission in equal measure.
Ounsworth’s vocals have also matured, now wielded in the service of haunting coos and moans that echo Thom Yorke (although he sees more influence from Television’s Tom Verlaine). In the title track, he cries out, “I will not raise a hand to stop you/ I don’t need to be strong/ I don’t care anymore,” though Ounsworth is cagey about the exact inspiration for these songs.
CYHSY’s auditory transitions were preceded by structural changes — the album, made over roughly two years, doesn’t feature multi-instrumentalists Robbie Guertin and Lee Sargent or bassist Tyler Sargent. It was created entirely by Ounsworth and drummer/programmer Sean Greenhalgh (who also departed the band a few months ago). “With all due respect to those guys, from the beginning, the band wasn’t entirely collaborative. All the records say, ‘All music and lyrics by Alec Ounsworth,’ and I imagined this as being a rotating cast,” he explains. His current touring band features bassist Matt Wong, guitarist/keyboardist Nick Krill and ex-War on Drugs drummer Patrick Berkery.
He also enlisted support from friends like The National frontman Matt Berninger and Canadian producer Kid Koala. Berninger’s contribution to standout track “Coming Down” — which Ounsworth says was inspired by the vocal contrast on the Velvet Underground’s “Lady Godiva’s Operation” — has been snarkily described as a sort of handout now that The National are selling out arenas. Ounsworth dismisses that. “Matt’s a friend, and I don’t think of him or The National as any different than I did back [when we toured with them].”
The new band and increased sense of creative control has allowed Ounsworth to make what he says is CYHSY’s best record yet.
Despite fronting a band whose uncontrollable public image has amounted to a somewhat contrived first impression, Ounsworth sees Only Run as revealing itself after repeat listens. Such an album may ultimately help CYHSY cast off its ghosts and join the indie big leagues that it seemed destined for all those years ago. Either way, Ounsworth isn’t really paying attention to what gets said about him or his friends. With Only Run, his resurrection may already be complete.
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah plays Fri., June 27, 9:30 p.m., $16, with Stagnant Pools, Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 Frankford Ave., 215-739-9684, johnnybrendas.com.
