Owen Pallett Has a 'Strange Relationship' With His Voice

It's easy to say that Owen Pallett has perfectionist tendencies. His new record 'Heartland' is the product of several years of work, and while he's often recognized for his ability to write music for string instruments, he tells Spinner that aside from experimenting with analog synthesizers, he really focused on non-string instruments this time. Namely, drum kits and his voice.

"I hate the sound of a kit, typically," Pallett says. "It was actually a big step for me to use like a traditional kit sound on this record. I love the Brian Eno records from the '70s -- there are very few moments where the sound you're hearing is the way that the instrument is meant to be played, just very non-traditional ways of playing instruments."

Indeed, 'Heartland' is full of orchestral pop tunes that explore seamlessly shifting time signatures throughout, but that's not the only thing that takes on new avenues of exploration. While sounding dark and dramatic, Pallett's voice demonstrates a control that his past records didn't seem to have, or at least highlight. And he knows, it too. "I have a strange relationship with my voice," he says. "There have been songs which I recorded in the past where I look back on and I say, 'That's a lame vocal performance.'"

For non-lame vocal performances on 'Heartland,' we recommend checking out tunes like 'The Great Elsewhere' and the jaunty 'Lewis Takes Off His Shirt' for a diverse showing of how Pallett compliments his voice with different compositional styles. "It's a really tricky thing for a musician," he says. "You have to deal with your voice, but I don't think there's a singer that doesn't to some degree hate their voice. With this record, I really woodshedded it and worked on it a lot."

'Heartland' is out now via Domino.