The Dears Done Looking Back: After a Doc Film & Book it's Forward in 2013

As 2012 draws to a close and a brand new year looms, many people are making resolutions and thinking about fresh starts. But few people are likely to be quite as excited about 2013's new possibilities as Murray Lightburn, singer and figurehead for Montreal band The Dears.

After a couple of years filled with introspection and retrospection, Lightburn and the band are glad to be moving on.

"Really," Lightburn tells Spinner. "If I have to look back one more time I might have to permanently place my head that way."

In 2011, the band participated in a number of interviews for the thoughtful and thorough biography The Dears: Lost in the Plot by journalist and longtime band friend Lorraine Carpenter. In 2012, they began work on Never Destroy Us: The Dears at Pasaguero, a concert film and documentary that aired on the CBC recently. Lightburn, reluctantly at first, agreed to direct the project, which chronicles the band's storied and stormy history and culminates with the debut of a new lineup to perform their last album Degeneration Street at a series of shows in Mexico.

"We've done a lot of looking back over the past couple of years," Lightburn muses. "We did that book with Lorraine and I was subjected to hours of interviews for that, and then we did this doc not six months after the book came out, after I'd just gotten over the fact that the book was out in the world. I'm just looking forward to looking forward."

There's plenty to look forward to in the world of The Dears right now.

"There a lot of stuff going on for 2013," the singer promises. Even if some of it is a little daunting. The band have written a number of new songs and they'll be back in the studio soon to begin the relatively momentous task of recording a follow-up to Degeneration Street.

"It's going to be a shit ton of work," Lightburn confesses with a laugh. "What I call starting at the bottom of Mount Everest. Every time you start a record, it's like 'Oh my God, there's so much fucking work to do!' And then you finish and you don't even realize that you've finished all the work."

Part of that work might include a live debut for the new music. The Dears premiered the material for Degeneration Street this way, playing the album in its entirety at a series of shows before releasing the record, and it was such a positive and vital experience that they're considering replicating the experiment this time around.

"Looking back," Lightburn starts, then catches himself with a laugh. Old habits die hard. "If I may, I think it's kind of the only way to present music -- directly in front of an audience. It teaches you to be a better musician and a better performer and really keeps you on your toes. And I think it's better for the audience, too."