o What: Cold War Kids in concert
o When: 9 p.m. March 3
o Where: McMenamins Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W. Burnside St., Portland.
o Cost: $24.50 through Ticketmaster, 800-745-3000 or http://ticketmaster.com.
Information: 503-225-0047 or http;//danceonair.com.
The title of the new Cold War Kids album, “Mine is Yours,” would seem like a pretty selfless statement.
But when it comes to the inner workings of the band, it’s a pretty ironic title considering how the creative dynamic among the group members changed with this new release.
On the first two Cold War Kids albums — 2005’s “Robbers & Cowards” and 2008’s “Loyalty to Loyalty” — the band had operated as a democracy, with each of the four members (singer-keyboardist-guitarist Nathan Willett, guitarist Jonnie Russell, bassist Matt Maust and drummer Matt Aveiro) seeking to contribute equally.
But after “Loyalty to Loyalty,” it was clear that democracy wasn’t working, Willett said. The group’s musical vision was blurred, and its songs didn’t reach their potential.
o What: Cold War Kids in concert
o When: 9 p.m. March 3
o Where: McMenamins Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W. Burnside St., Portland.
o Cost: $24.50 through Ticketmaster, 800-745-3000 or http://ticketmaster.com.
Information: 503-225-0047 or http;//danceonair.com.
Complete equality wasn’t working.
“I had to kind of step up and be a band leader,” Willett said. “It was kind of scary.”
He was nervous about telling his friends what to do, and about hurting the delicate chemistry of the band, he said, but he also worried that communication shortcomings had held the group back and prevented earlier songs from reaching their potential.
When making “Loyalty to Loyalty,” Willett said, “We didn’t really know how to be really critical of each other, in terms of just how to make things better, how to say, ‘What you’re doing is OK, but it’s not great.’”
Willett and the rest of the members of Cold War Kids had to overcome that fear before they could make “Mine is Yours.”
The new album also reflects an evolution in how the group records its music.
Both “Robbers & Cowards” and “Loyalty to Loyalty” were recorded in a matter of days; the band wanted to retain the feel and the spontaneity of its live sound.
“There were a lot of things that could have been tweaked or could have been better,” Willett said. “We just kind of wanted to get in and get out. We put some time into having it sound good and engineering it, but we didn’t put that much time into tinkering with the song structures. … We didn’t really didn’t know how to be critical of each other’s performances or have the language to do that yet.”
But for “Mine Is Yours,” Cold War Kids embraced the studio. The group took time to develop and refine its songs.
The result is an album that still sounds like Cold War Kids but with a fuller sound and fewer of the jagged edges common in the rocking pop songs on the first two releases. “Mine Is Yours” is also arguably the most melodic Cold War Kids album yet. Willett said he hears some other contrasts in the music on the new CD as well.
“The song ‘Cold Toes on the Cold Floor’ definitely reminds me the most of the things that we do very instinctually,” he said. It reminds him of earlier songs such as “God, Make up Your Mind” from “Robbers & Cowards,” defined by restraint and patience with each and every instrument.
So far, the new songs fit in well alongside earlier tunes in live performances, Willett said. He just wishes the group could get away with playing more of the new material, he said.
“We actually play about half new songs,” Willett said of the song set. “I just think these songs are so good, and the way the album, start to finish, is so much better than what we’ve done before, it’s hard not to want to play all of it.”
