JAPANDROIDS RELEASE ‘FATE & ALCOHOL’ TODAY
THE BAND’S FINAL ALBUM IN A NEARLY TWENTY-YEAR CAREER
“‘Fate & Alcohol’ is a bittersweet proposition,” says Ian Cohen of Japandroids’ last album, in a Stereogum cover story that has become the band’s final interview together. “King and Prowse have overcome seismic life changes, their paradoxical perfectionism, catastrophic breakups, and thousands of miles to finish one last record … Given how the band has explained its past albums as a necessary evil to get back on the road, it’s amazing that ‘Fate & Alcohol’ exists at all. But from the moment the gang vocals pop in on the opening “Eye Contact High,” I start grinning like an idiot again, wishing Japandroids would come back to life for one last hurrah.” Out today, listen to ‘Fate & Alcohol’ in full HERE.
The Vancouver duo, comprised of singer and guitarist Brian King and drummer Dave Prowse, met in the early 2000s as students at The University of Victoria in British Columbia. They quickly bonded over a shared love of Wolf Parade and Constantines, bands whose earnest, heart-on-sleeve indie rock would become a blueprint for Japandroids, which they’d eventually form in 2006 as the two found themselves both living and working in Vancouver. “From the moment we started playing,” Prowse says, “there was something that felt special to both of us.”
Over the next 18 years they would make records and play shows like each one might be their last. While their scrappy 2009 debut LP, ‘Post Nothing’, brought them renown and critical acclaim outside of Vancouver, its thunderous 2012 follow-up, ‘Celebration Rock’, was a breakthrough on every level—a beloved, career-defining triumph that is still widely considered one of the best rock albums of the 21st century. One only needs to watch the five-minute black-and-white encapsulation of their heady, high-energy live shows and demanding yet exhilarating life on the road in the music video “The House That Heaven Built” to get their heart racing and fist pumping the same way it did over a decade ago.
‘Celebration Rock’ made Japandroids a fixture at festivals and on late-night TV and inspired an equally passionate response from new fans around the world, one that was wilder and more wondrous than anything they could have imagined. Fast forward a few years and they were headlining Toronto’s Massey Hall, a Canadian landmark and national treasure. By remaining true to the joys of their first jam sessions, they’ve become a great and life-affirming rock band on their own terms, in their own way.
Recorded in Vancouver with longtime collaborator Jesse Gander, ‘Fate & Alcohol’ finds them pursuing new ways to bottle that same rush – If 2017’s ‘Near to the Wild Heart of Life’ found the duo pushing themselves to write music that didn’t rely on (or simply recreate) the raw power and easy pleasures of ‘Celebration Rock’, ‘Fate & Alcohol’ is meant to merge what they loved about each album. “As a band, you always want to feel like you’re progressing while simultaneously preserving what’s unique about you,” King says. “This record combines the energy and abandon of the first two with the storytelling of ‘Near to the Wild Heart of Life’—youthful exuberance but tempered with a point of view, of life lived.”
Look back on their body of work and you’ll find songs that feel like they were written for this moment, for an ending. Songs of celebration and adventure and tomorrows deferred, but also, at their heart, songs about the fleeting nature of everything. If Japandroids wrote and played like this—a dream from the start—might end at any second, it’s because they knew it could. All great things do.
Praise for Japandroids:
“From day one, they’ve wanted to be the house band for the most pivotal moments of your life, bashing out the sort of garage-spawned, arena-sized pop-punk anthems that instinctively make you want to wrap your arms around your best mate and yell like hell to the heavens.” – Pitchfork
“For all the descriptive language they use, descriptive language can’t really adequately evoke how much beautiful, blown-out noise is produced by these two people, how much better they are at this than dozens of bands who’ve tried. ” – SPIN
“Even when Japandroids expand musically, they always deliver something that is distinctly of themselves.” – GQ
“Japandroids has evolved from a firehose of guitar feedback and positive vibes to a more erudite and purposeful — but still endearingly slapdash — pair of rock torchbearers.” – The New York Times
“The whole point of this band is to let go of your inhibitions and give yourself over to larger-than-life celebration rock. “Chicago” gives us more than enough to work with in that regard.” – Stereogum
“While it’s sad that Japandroids is coming to a close officially, it’s fun to hear David Prowse and Brian King make their exit with a sense of fiery urgency. Lead single “Chicago” conveys that urgency with its brisk pace and suffocating guitars, ensuring that the beloved duo go out like an explosive firework.” – Uproxx
Photo Credit: Dan Monick
Order ‘Fate & Alcohol’
1. Eye Contact High
2. D&T
3. Alice
4. Chicago
5. Upon Sober Reflection
6. Fugitive Summer
7. A Gaslight Anthem
8. Positively 34th Street
9. One Without the Other
10. All Bets Are Off