Blitzen Trapper Take Piecemeal Approach on 'Destroyer of the Void'

With Blitzen Trapper's 2008 breakout album 'Furr,' we learned that the band was pretty adept at making modern country-rock songs. Throughout their relentless touring cycle, lead songwriter, guitarist and vocalist Eric Earley was busy penning the material for what would become 'Destoryer of the Void,' the Portland, Ore., group's fifth album, which boasts a few intricacies that listeners might find interesting.

First, the title track, which opens the 12-song set, is actually three songs Earley had written, pieced together. "I was experimenting to see what would happen if I played this long sort of journey as a song," he tells Spinner. "It hangs together in a certain way, but I'm not sure I meant to initially. I was working on them all at the same time."

Indeed, this isn't anything you want to put on while doing chores -- it's a long and winding song that takes listeners through subtle shifts, over the course of six minutes. Pianos are featured prominently during the middle part, as Earley discusses how his "petty crimes and curses" are destroyed. What those petty crimes are we're not exactly sure, but he says the song's complexity is something born out of wanting to do something different. "You definitely wanted to do something different. You want to do that but I approached the new record song by song," he says. "I continued writing songs as we were touring and they ended up being what they were. I don't think I gave a whole lot of thought."

But even with a lot of the material on 'Destroyer of the Void' surfacing over the last few years in Earley's writing, he also dusted off a bunch of older, unfinished pieces of music. For example, the five-minute, mid-tempo folk ballad 'Below the Hurricane,' another song that was built in two different parts.

"The first section is an older song from years ago that I'd never really finished," Earley says. "I just pulled it out and finished the lyrics, and the last part I had bits and pieces of and finished that one. It was a skeleton song I had laying around. I'm always like 'I'll get back to that.'"

Blitzen Trapper are set to hit the road later this month, with high profile slots at Seattle's Capitol City Block Party, the Newport Folk Festival and Lollapalooza. 'Destroyer of the Void' is out now on Sub Pop.