Department of Eagles In Ear Park by: Steve Scully Mon:13-Oct-08 Label: 4AD Year: 2008 WB rating 88 out of 100

Side-project, off-shoot, mistress, bit-on-the-side: whatever you call it, it’s a common thing nowadays for members of successful (and unsuccessful) bands to have a second outlet for their creative juices. Jack White’s got the Raconteurs, Jeff Tweedy’s got Loose Fur. Hell, even Thom Yorke decided to do a solo stint. Now Daniel Rossen (from Grizzly Bear) has Department of Eagles.

While Grizzly Bear still resides underground, with naught but a devoted fan base and one excellent album to their name (Yellow House), Rossen has found the baggage of the band too much of a constraint and has reverted to his pre-band activities. Yes, before there was Grizzly Bear, Rossen and his friend Fred Nicolaus had Department of Eagles. Whether Rossen should have bothered is the first question that springs to mind. A great deal of In Ear Park bears similarities to Grizzly Bear’s work: the heavy reverb making the vocals sound distant amidst the sprawling instrumentation; the subtle melodies weaving their way through synapses, circumnavigating neurons and lobes to lodge themselves firmly in your head. In Ear Park is, however, denser and more ingenious a record than anything Grizzly Bear has produced.

Something that resonates so strongly after just the first listen to In Ear Park is that it is beautifully and strikingly relevant – we can now add Department of Eagles to Fleet Foxes and Bon Iver as 2008’s examples of indie music’s current climate. The graceful waltz of opening track ‘In Ear Park’ weaves its magic around a slow-burning piano and culminates in an off-kilter, depressant-laden carnival atmosphere. Similarly, they embrace synth and subtle electro techniques in understated folk gems like ‘Phantom Other’ – the track swells to a profound conclusion, full of fuzz and multi-tracked vocals – while maintaining that organic, musician’s touch, strings and simple guitar form the basis for the superb ‘Teenagers’, vocal harmonies and piano and a slight acoustic guitar play off one another to create the stunningly quirky Beatles-esque ‘Herring Bone’.

Department of Eagles find their feet on a variety of terrains, the quiet folk of ‘Floating on the Lehigh’; the Classic rock, Kinks-ish feel of ‘No One Does It’ (with a rhythm that sounds like it’s been taken right off Tom Waits’ Real Gone album) and the strong dynamic shifts and almost ‘noise pop’ crescendo of ‘Waves of Rye’. In every way, the band shows that they are not only consummate musicians and songwriters, but attuned perfectly to the needs and desires of pop listeners. In each song resides either a melodic hook or an ingenious structural or instrumental moment, either of which catches your attention and requires a re-listen.

Rossen may need to wrest himself from the clutches of Department of Eagles soon to satisfy his Grizzly Bear teammates, but in light of this record I’m yet to be convinced that it would be the wisest option. In Ear Park may find a great deal of higher-profile competition for album of the year, but for sheer cleverness, pop nous and consistency, it matches its opposition.