Tokyo Police Club embrace internet successDaily Collegian | April 25, 2008
The youthful Canadian quartet started out in 2005, building a small following while generating buzz in their local Toronto area, catapulting them to play larger venues and local festivals, and ultimately signing a deal with the Canadian-based independent label Paper Bag Records to release their first studio recording.
In 2006, "A Lesson in Crime" was released to the public; a debut collection of frantic and quick-hitting tracks that seemingly defied genre typecasting. The band teased listeners with its potential and brevity by racing through the EP's eight tracks with reckless abandon, the finished product clocking in at fewer than 17 minutes.
While some mainstream music critics lauded this as a glaring flaw, the album was openly embraced for its frenetic pace and audacity by bloggers and online music communities. This freshly-generated publicity catapulted the band from localized obscurity into the mainstream musical climate.
"It was really surprising but awesome," said keyboardist Graham Wright of the online buzz that surrounded the band in a recent phone interview with The Daily Collegian. "But with any kind of hype you have to take it with a grain of salt really."
Modest in both experience and nature, Wright, as well as the rest of the band, is very conscious of the power online communities have on propelling relatively unknown bands into national prominence.
"I think Vampire Weekend is the prime example, their like what, the biggest band in the world now? The people creating the hype today are just regular people, not necessarily professionally-trained writers, just people with blogs," Wright said.
"These are everyday people, so they don't have to deal with the pressures or the politics of more traditional media. They have no loyalties so they can turn on you just as easy as they praised you and that hype can disappear really quickly."
In the wake of "Crime's" success and the bands growing online contingent of supporters the band signed to Omaha-based Saddle Creek Records in 2007, a partnership that left many fans perplexed given the two parties contrasting trademark sounds.
"Initially I was a bit skeptical of signing with Saddle Creek" Wright said of the partnership. "We really don't fit that 'Saddle Creek' sound they are so well known for. But looking back I truly believe it was the best choice, it has worked out better than I dared imagine."
While the band is admittedly overjoyed with how their affiliation with the label has turned out, the jump from a small independent label to Saddle Creek was hardly a rash decision.
"We talked to every record label we could think of both big and small," said Wright. "When it finally came down to it Saddle Creek really just offered the best of both worlds for us by being small enough to get in personal contact with while still being large enough to transcend beyond the indie scene. They're really super great people too."
Last Tuesday, the bands first full-length offering from Saddle Creek, "Elephant Shell," was released in stores. While still possessing the band's unmistakable style of relatively brief and quick-paced songs, "Elephant Shell's" sound is decidedly less scattered than its predecessor and can be best described as a more centralized, cohesive effort than "A Lesson in Crime."
As with any shift in sound, there is always the chance of a backlash from fans, but according to Wright, this was a risk the band was willing to take as they strongly believe in the quality of their latest album.
"The reaction from fans has been mixed, which is honestly what I expected," Wright said in regards to fan feedback, "Some of our diehard fans, if I can really use the term die-hard, seemed a bit puzzled at first, but we have gotten some really positive responses as well. The album is defiantly different in some very key ways [from 'A Lesson in Crime,'] so it takes a little while to warm up to. I'm sure it'll grow on them though, it did for me."
One thing fans and critics universally can agree on is that even with the lengthier confines of a full-length album, the band still has a flair for creating songs that barely break the two-minute barrier. "My first thought was 'Oh great, we made another batch of two minute songs,' but we honestly never put any thought into how long a song is going to be" Wright said with a slight chuckle, adding, "We don't go back and add things in after the fact, we just write them the way we do. I guess you could say we have musical ADD."
With their current tour, the band hopes to win over more fans that may be on the fence about the new album and, according to Wright, this has been going exactly as planned.
"The tour has been going great and we've been playing some fantastic shows to some really responsive fans," Wright said. "We're all excited to come back to Northampton; Pearl Street is a really awesome venue."
Tokyo Police Club plays Saturday, April 26 with opening acts Smoosh and Who Shot Hollywood at the Pearl Street Night Club in Northampton. Doors open for the event at 8:30 p.m. and tickets are $12.50 in advance, $15 at the door.
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