Destroyer - Dan’s Boogie Review
Dan Bejar captures the light that shines through his half empty glass.
Just before the two minute mark of ‘Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World’ the second single from Destroyer’s new record, a guitar screeches and Dan Bejar breaks the fourth wall to announce “We are now entering a new phase.” He describes being mistaken for a priest and a Houston rocket, of hiding inside a bass during an orgy. The kind of stream of conscious lyric that Bejar specialises in. The line can also be taken as a career announcement from an artist who, 14 albums in, makes light work of carving out new directions for his band.
Truthfully it takes about one second for Dan’s Boogie to reveal itself as a new direction for Destroyer. The initial spill of strings that comes from ‘The Same Thing as Nothing at All’ is so striking that the flourish almost appears to catch the song itself off guard. A battle of drums and a searching guitar riff follows as the song tries to work out where it wants to go next, before deciding on cascading pianos and further rushes of strings. Put into the context of Destroyer’s catalog, it lands somewhere between Your Blues and Poison Season and marks an end to the synth driven era that spanned three albums and concluded with 2022’s Labyrinthitis.
Talking to Larry Fitzmaurice for his Last Donut of the Night Substack, Bejar confessed doubts about that record: “The first thing we did on this record is we (Bejar and producer John Collins) turned to each other and were like, "I don't really know about that last record," which felt really good. Usually, you're not supposed to have those revelations—and if you do, you're not supposed to say them out loud.” The harshness, as Bejar puts it, of that record is gone. Here the songs are plush and spacious. Bejar composed most of them in a short burst of productivity after a self-imposed abstinence from song writing and several sound like they could not stand any more time cooped up in the singer’s head. ‘Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World’ has a galloping drum beat that Bejar’s vocal can just about keep up with. ‘Dan’s Boogie’ glides on piano and strings. The album's best song, ‘Cataract Time’, languidly bends and stretches itself out over an epic 8 minute groove.
Bejar’s lyrics tend not to be autobiographical. They are sung by a narrator who is usually slightly madcap or villainous. In 2011's Kaputt, it was an aging playboy. On Labyrinthitis it was someone who can only be described as an arsehole. The narrators on Dan’s Boogie are unlikely to win any person of the year awards, especially not the one on the title track who offers his affirmations towards a horse's ass (“not bad”). But this group do elicit more sympathy. They are lost and aimless. They follow the breeze, get lost downtown and walk to the park just to walk home again. They describe life as “a lot of near hits, some misses”. So you can imagine they need the consoling arm around the shoulder that Bejar gives them in the form of ‘Travel Light’, the album’s close. A lonesome barroom piano number, the song suggests a jaunt and a defiance that can be found in wandering down your own path - Bejar would know.