One Track Mind

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

[ download ]

Long before Mike Kinsella began his solo career as Owen, he had built his reputation through his contributions to Chicago area indie acts like American Football, Owls, and Joan of Arc. As with his solo persona, these bands all shared a proclivity toward proudly unbridled emotion and a certain sensitivity, but as Owen, Kinsella stripped down his sonic framework to create an even more sparsely populated atmosphere. Since his last record in 2006, Kinsella has gotten married and become a father, and to complement these changes, the sound on New Leaves–his fifth solo record due September 22nd–has seen some changes as well.

Case in point: “Good Friends, Bad Habits,” the first single from New Leaves. In addition to Owen’s typical dewy guitars and sedate percussion, the song shades in details with some floating synthesizer lines. On paper, this may not seem like much, but it helps to add another dimension to an approach which felt too one-dimensional at times in the past. There is also something to the choked gait of Kinsella’s guitar solo on this track which speaks to the tension between his knack for keeping his music tidy and yet wanting to expand upon his typical palette. Lyrically, the song echoes the theme of needing to reconcile getting older with staying young; the fact that the narrator’s friends “fuck like Wilde / and they’ll die like Hemingway” is seen as both romantic and untenable.

Something I’ve always admired about Owen is Kinsella’s investment in a sound which, though frequently beautiful, seems an easy one to knock. By fleshing things out by a small degree on “Good Friends, Bad Habits” and by elevating the sheen on his production, Kinsella has found a way of taking his songwriting someplace new without forsaking the vision he’s had all along.