The music industry convention of calling a second album
a “sophomore record” makes it sound like
rock is some kind of college, which is weird. If Born
Ruffians’ 2008 debut album Red Yellow and Blue
was the result of a talented and precocious gang of
freshmen, their 2010 follow-up, Say It, would be the
project they left school to finish — a declaration
that they’re smart and ambitious enough to make
it on their own, and furthermore, that they’re
in it for the long haul.
Where Red Yellow Blue began with a utopian dream, Say
It opens with “Oh Man,” a jagged romp that
finds singer/guitarist Luke Lalonde shaking his head
at a romantic fool, and trying to steer him right. “You’ve
got to go man,” he explains, riding smoothly over
Mitch DeRosier’s galloping bassline and Steve
Hamelin’s malleable but steady drum pattern, “and
go take your place in this wonderful race.” A
ragged echo slaps back at the guitar like wind in the
band’s faces; they don’t flinch.
“We had two and a half weeks to work on Say It,”
Lalonde says, “which wasn’t quite a luxurious
amount of time, but it was more luxurious than we had
during the sessions for Red, Yellow and Blue, when we
had two weeks to record and mix it. Then, we were doing
two songs a day.” Again teaming up with producer
Rusty Santos, the Ruffians and co. holed up at Mississauga’s
Metalworks studio and loosed the reins on their ambitions,
experimenting with Minimoogs and saxophones before eventually
scaling much of it back in the mixing process. Not that
it was a wasted effort; DeRosier says, “I think
it was important that we did that, adding things just
to hear how they sounded.”
You can still hear the nuts and bolts of the songs,
with guitar hanging out on its own (the jagged arpeggios
in “Late”) or a bassline running away with
that infectious crazy-quilt, “Retard Canard.”
Which, incidentally, isn’t about the developmentally
delayed. Lalonde: “Retard Canard is about a certain
kind of person who feels like they don’t fit in,
or can’t fit in and get along in life. That’s
where the “not part of the human race” lyric
comes from; it’s about how you just have to do
it, or die trying.” And the residue of their production
experiments can be traced in the swooning sax licks
dangling over “Come Back” or the watery
synths lurking in the tightly-wound “What To Say”:
“When I get drunk I’m speaking more / get
too drunk and I don’t speak at all / get too close
to you and I don’t know / what to say.”
Hamelin describes “What To Say” as “one
of those songs where we put it together out of a bunch
of different ideas, and it really came together as a
cohesive whole. Unlike some of the songs we’ve
put together out of a bunch of ideas, and they sound
like a bunch of different ideas.” The parts hang
together, a clattering machine bonded by a combination
of kinetic energy and unshakeable confidence.
With Hamelin having reversed his earlier declaration
that he no longer planned to tour with the band (“Steve
was always going to be recording with us,” says
Lalonde. “If we had to get another drummer to
go on tour, we would have done it”) and ex-Caribou
bassist Andy Lloyd joining them on tour to fill out
Say It’s added complexities, Born Ruffians are
ready to pull on their boots and get down to business.
Let the sophomores stumble — these guys are showing
up to work every day, paying the rent on time and sharing
a secret laugh with the bartender. School’s out.
–Dave Morris
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