Music, Style & Culture

Death Cab For Cutie: ‘It’s Pathetic When Artists Hide Behind Vices’

Life is pretty sweet for Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard.

Having a Billboard Number 1 album, selling out arenas and marrying the beautiful Zooey Deschanel within two years would suggest that life is pretty sweet for Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard. With the release of ‘Codes and Keys’, the frontman tells Alexia Kapranos how his new experiences and old life have shaped their latest musical output.

Your last record ‘Narrow Stairs’ was apparently influenced by heavy sludge music, and ‘Codes and Keys’ is said to be less guitar centric. Is this the case?
Well, it’s not our ‘Kid A’. There are certainly guitars on this record, but they’re more textural rather than being used to prop up the songs. It’s kind of like Death Cab up in Space, but with the focus of seeing Earth.

Maybe this could be the next record they play on the Moon?
I hope so, but if I ever go on the Moon, I’m playing Brian Eno’s ‘An Ending (An Ascent)’ from ‘Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks’, which is the most beautiful piece of music ever recorded.

Good to hear you’re not a vain rocker then! But if you were to choose one song on the new record that you’re most proud of, which would it be?
‘Doors Unlocked and Open’ because I tend to be a verbose songwriter and I use the first verse of a song to set up a scene, but with this it’s as focused a picture as I could make. I like how it opens up, the fact that it’s longer and the change from a very minor to a very major key.

Single ‘You Are A Tourist’ says “If you feel just like a tourist in the city you were born, then it’s time to go.” Does this refer to your move from Washington to LA?
It was certainly inspired by it! It’s about coming home and suddenly it feels very foreign to you because people have been living their lives in one place while you’ve been living your life in many, so the place becomes less familiar. Moving to a new city made me realise how little I knew the people in the place I called home for so many years – not in a bad way, but a bittersweet way. On record I know I have trash-talked Los Angeles, but I’ve grown to love it.

So how has being married coloured your perspectives in your latest songs?
I pride myself as being very honest as a songwriter. Not that the songs are about me, but what happens to the circle of people around you is always going to make it onto the album.

You’ve spoken about how your writing is more balanced since you stopped drinking. Was alcohol ever a benefit for getting your creative juices flowing?
Even when I was a drinker, I always wrote sober! There’s always someone worse than you and there’s always someone who drinks more, but for me, enough was enough. Drink was never an inspiration for me. It’s pathetic when artists hide behind vices and use them as a crutch for their creativity. I don’t think it’s necessary to be a drug addict or womaniser to make good art. Pink Floyd didn’t do as many drugs as the people who listened to them! Kerouac was not good because he drank but because he was an amazing writer. Have you seen Shane MacGowan recently?! It’s really sad – one of our generation’s greater songwriters – and he’s so far gone… he’ll never write something great again.

What sparked your shooting a one-take live music video for ‘You Are A Tourist’?
No one has ever shot a live video before, so we took the idea to [our record label] Atlantic, who suggested Tim Nackashi as director. They did all the hard work, heavy lifting and we just had to waltz in!

What is the message of the title ‘Codes and Keys’?
The secret codes we have in our lives and the secret languages we have with those people – inside jokes, slang and the codes that connect you to a person so that only the two of you know that language. Or to Chris, it’s the code to get into your apartment or open your phone or other lines of communication. Key is the other part of it – there’s the key to open up your heart or a door, which is also metaphorically between you and other people.

Finally, with your band’s name being Death Cab, have you ever had an inspirational taxi ride?
One time I had an Eastern European cab driver who was working 20 hours a day to put his daughter through college. He was an example of someone working so hard to make a life for himself and his family, which was moving when there’s such negativity and bullshit that people come to our country and “take jobs” when immigrants are the backbone of this country. I can’t imagine – even with all my travelling in the band – how hard it must be to leave everything you’ve ever known and start over.

Death Cab For Cutie’s new album ‘Codes & Keys’ is out now via Atlantic Records. The band will play London's O2 Academy Brixton tomorrow, 7th July.

Taken from the Summer 2011 issue of DIY, available now. For more details click here.