Music

RDIO PLAYLIST OF THE WEEK: La Dispute

by Sam Sutherland

When La Dispute released the Vancouver EP in 2006, it would have been hard to imagine the youthful Grand Rapids five-piece exploding into the international screamo revival superkings they are today. But it was the ambitious Somewhere At the Bottom of the River Between Vega and Altair, released two years later on No Sleep Records, that marked the arrival of a new voice in an unexpected reclamation of the bastardized “screamo” tag.

New bands like La Dispute, Touche Amore, and Pianos Become the Teeth were suddenly and surprisingly clawing back the ground lost to trashcan emo-lite swoop-core piles of hair products that had never actually heard a pg. 99 record in their life. But the craziest part was that it was just old, pudgy Saetia fans getting stoked — these bands were converting kids, bringing an earnest and direct approach to heavy music that was connecting in a way that the entire Victory Records roster hadn’t in years.

La Dispute’s most recent achievement is Wildlife, a startling sophomore record that equals the ambition of its lyrical narratives with stark instrumental accompaniment. Driven by tales of the people inhabiting the band’s Michigan hometown, there is a rare symbiotic tie between the riveting stories and the equally powerful songs constructed by the band around them. Amongst the core of revival acts that is sometimes sarcastically referred to as “the wave,” the album sets a serious artistic high water mark. The fact that it’s not just slovenly critics freaking out, but also kids in mosh pits, is just icing on a sweet, sweet cake.

Here, the band has collected some of their favourite songs of 2011, a list fairly indicative of the variety present in the band’s sound, from the gentle (Fleet Foxes) to the agro (peers Pianos Become the Teeth).