Brasstronaut, NXNE: Orchestral Indie Rockers Circle Back With 'Mean Sun'

A lot of bands are faced with the prospect of following up a critically acclaimed album. Few turn their backs on the sound that brought them success in the first place; even fewer manage to do it well.

Vancouver's Brasstronaut are one of those bands.

"If we had an idea, we'd test it out and if it didn't work we'd throw it away," Brasstronaut singer and pianist Edo Van Breeman tells Spinner while discussing the band's sophomore album, Mean Sun, last month. "The only intentional part of that project was to push our instruments to create a texture."

That's a big change from the sextet's debut, Mt. Chimaera, a record with sweeping pop ambitions. The album received a warm reception both in Europe and here in Canada, where it was long listed for the 2010 Polaris Music Prize. But then, Brasstronaut today are much different from the band that made Mt. Chimaera. Van Breeman, trumpet player Bryan Davies, bass player John Walsh and drummer Brennan Saul met guitarist Tariq Hussain and clarinet and EWI player Sam Davidson while in residency at the Banff Centre in 2009 where part of the album was recorded. Those sessions were then torn apart or rerecorded entirely back in Vancouver.

"This is a much more coherent recording and creative process," say Van Breeman. "Playing a lot live has affected our understanding of what works with the band. You know how to push them in the right direction."

A filmmaker friend of the band was out of town last summer, leaving a giant industrial warehouse in Vancouver's Strathcona neighborhood at their disposal.

"We'd got there in the late afternoon, drink beer and watch the sun go down," says Van Breeman.

The band, who'll be part of NXNE 2012 in Toronto in mid-June, also wrote and played music, creating the bulk of what would become Mean Sun in just a month and a half.

"I think these new songs sound more natural whereas with Mt. Chimaera," says Van Breeman. "I wouldn't use the word 'sterile,' but that's kind of what it is."

Song structures were meticulously planned out prior to recording with Colin Stewart at the Hive Creative Labs, where the band laid down bass drum, keys and guitars in the simultaneously.

"We had a pretty good idea of what the bed track arrangements would be like."

Then more sounds, including clarinet and horns were layered on top. Yet, rather than sounding jammy and self-indulgent (which would certainly have caused those "indie-jazz" labels to persist) the album maintains a washed-over flow.

"Its minimalism in the same way I really enjoy Four Tet," says Van Breeman, comparing themselves to the British electronic act. "It's a record you can get something new from every time you listen to it."

Brasstronaut play Spinner AOL's free concert at Yonge-Dundas Square in Toronto at 1 p.m. on June. 16.

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