Bishop Allen

Of all the malaises facing indie pop, few can be more odious than the conceit of turning that simple thing, a song title, into a needlessly complex and irrelevant bit of intellectual posturing. Even a band like Bishop Allen, which continues their light-hearted brand of pop/rock on their third album “Grr…,” are not immune to this malady. A song about a dysfunctional relationship is titled “South China Moon,” an image that, while repeated throughout the song, does nothing to advance its meaning. To be fair, this device is as old as rock and roll. There is more than an echo of The Beatles’ “Isn’t it good / Norwegian Wood” in Bishop Allen’s “I’ll come back to you / South China Moon.” Its use, however, is representative of a larger theme of this new album. Co-frontmen Justin A. Rice ’99 and Christian A. Rudder ’98 share mic and songwriting duties with Rudder writing the bulk of the songs this time around, and the result is a safe, predictable work that obeys genre conventions without challenging them. “Grr…” always keeps the listener mildly engaged while making no real impact.

This pattern is established on the first track, “Dimmer,” which opens with soft, driving bass and percussion before moving into a self-deprecating account of Rudder’s insecurities. All of it—the theme, the frail and vulnerable vocals, the clean production and the reliance on pop form—play to expectations. “I would pick the darkest horse / that’s the horse I’d ride,” he sings. Would an indie pop frontman pick any other? “Dimmer” is a catchy enough piece of music, but it fails to develop after the first few chords, and repeated listens reveal no real nuance or subtlety, something that is true all-too-often of the songs on this album.

Bass, electric guitar and drums are augmented elsewhere by acoustic guitar and that indie pop favorite, keyboards. Strings are largely absent as Bishop Allen choose a simpler sound that emphasizes their songwriting. This might seem like a wise decision, as Rice and Rudder have acquired a reputation for witty wordplay and elegant storytelling, but on “Grr…” the songwriting disappoints most of all. To be sure, there is the odd line that stands out for refreshing cleverness or insight; in the otherwise drab “Don’t Hideaway,” “I’m going to write you a letter / every day you like you were a debtor” humorously captures the stalker-like intensity with which the narrator commands his beloved not to “hideaway.” But these instances are notable chiefly for their rarity.

A much more representative example of the songwriting comes from “Cue the Elephants”: “The morning belonged to the grapefruit / Ripe in the gold Roman sun.” This kind of pretension is more grating even than that of “South China Moon” and, once again, represents the genre at its worst. An isolated instance of clever wordplay does not an Elvis Costello make.

That is not to say that “Grr…” is uniformly without merit. There are moments, few as they are in this album, where Bishop Allen does move beyond the formula. The band is most potent on the four-song stretch from “Dirt on Your Shoes” to “True and False.” “Dirt on Your Shoes” is the strongest, because it is the only song that grows and surprises, moving from a generic acoustic opening to a power-chord-filled chorus, accompanied by a lyrical tone of caustic attack rather than the complacent introspection that characterizes the rest of the album. It is the only song that possesses that vital quality that “Grr…” as a whole sorely lacks: dynamism. By contrast, “Oklahoma” is sunny and even joyous, with chiming arpeggios helping to create a genuinely enjoyable, if minor, diversion. “Oklahoma” leads into “The Ancient Commonsense of Things,” where a pretty melody complements a theme, as stated in the title, that is the album’s one departure from the typical concerns of the genre. Prettiest of all is “True and False,” where guest vocalist Darbie Nowatka successfully captures the sweet vulnerability that Rudder cannot.

These pleasant interludes are the highlights of what is, unquestionably, a mediocre album. “Grrr…” suffers both from its lack of ambition and its dreary songwriting. Their last effort, “Broken String,” while not a radical effort, was expansive and risky by comparison, and coming two years later, “Grrr…” feels like a retreat. Without focus and ambition, Bishop Allen risk losing all claims to aesthetic necessity.