ECCO I METRIC CON “SYNTHETICA”

Usually in rock and roll, it’s somewhat common for a band to take a break after touring before starting on the next project. Not so for the Canadian alternative rock band Metric. After performing their last show on a tour in support of their album, “Fantasies,” in 2010, the band went straight to work on their follow-up record the next day. Even Metric’s singer and keyboardist, Emily Haines, acknowledges that it was unusual for the band to do that. “We have our own studio in Toronto, which is a wonderful place to hide out and hibernate,” she says. “We wanted to keep the momentum and positivity from “Fantasies.” I’m glad we went straight in.”

The result of Metric’s enthusiasm to get to work right away is “Synthetica” (due out Tuesday), a dazzling rock album drawing on introspective and universal themes augmented by electronic-influenced ambient textures. It’s the latest from the band–whose members consist of Haines, guitarist Jimmy Shaw, drummer Joules Scott Key, and bassist Joshua Winstead–during what seems to be a very creative period. In addition to the release of the “Fantasies” album in 2009, the band has also toured and performed soundtrack work on “Twilight: Eclipse” and most recently on David Cronenberg’s new film “Cosmopolis.”

In describing “Synthetica,” Haines had wrote on the band’s Web site that the album “is about forcing yourself to confront what you see in the mirror when you finally stand still long enough to catch a reflection.”

“This is what kept happening in the making of this record,” she explains to CBSNews.com, “was anytime I would move toward introspection, it was sort of like a secret door that would open up and I would find myself moving towards an observation about something external. In a way, that feeling is a sense that I think everyone has at this moment — anyone who remembers life before this online revolution that we all now exist in 24 hours a day — the sense that there really isn’t any time for anyone to stop and reflect. We’re constantly generating content to fuel this…whatever it is, it requires all of our attention all the time, and it’s sometimes questionable what the value is of what we’re all creating. I think that kept happening again personally, and then going out into looking at the state of things in popular culture and even in the political realm.”

The state of things could apply to the album’s first single, “Youth Without Youth,” given the Occupy Movement. Says Haines: “I’m quite pleased that the song seems to resonate and reflect the sense that young people today are really facing the frightening prospect of, ‘Here’s what we’re handing you: a completely damaged planet, for which we weren’t told the damage is irreversible, plenty of money for the banks, and a lifetime of student debt if you make it into an education that doesn’t guarantee you of any kind of livelihood.'”

Although some of the songs on “Synthetica” offer a bleak view of things, like the aformentioned “Youth Without Youth” and “Speed the Collapse,” there are also hopeful-sounding tracks such as “Nothing But Time” and “Dreams So Real.” “In the studio,” says Haines, “our process instead of being the conventional thing of, ‘Okay, we got 12 songs on the board,’ it was literally hundreds of fragments from melodies to chord progressions and lyrical ideas – pieces of things that we knew were important, but we just couldn’t quite conceive of where they belong in relation to each other. It’s almost as though we asked ourselves those questions of how bad is it and ultimately would arrive at the answer– that we feel hopeful, we feel alive…we want to participate and carry on.”

Metric (Credit: Justin Broadbent)
One of the highlights of “Synthetica” is the appearance of Lou Reed on the dreamy track “The Wanderlust.” Haines, a fan of Reed’s work with the Velvet Underground and his solo career, had first met the legendary rocker at a Neil Young tribute concert. ” [The band and I] were working at Electric Lady where we finished the record,” Haines says. [“For “The Wanderlust,”] it suddenly struck me we needed this voice of wisdom and experience to contrast this innocent and uplifting sort of vocal style that is part of that song, that spirit of wanting adventure and travel. [Lou] said yes, came into the studio. We went into the vocal booth together as he insisted and that stands as one of my favorite memories of all time. I think it’s so cool he was backing me up.”

Following an appearance at Chicago’s Lollapalooza this August, Metric will tour the States beginning Sept. 12, including a date at New York’s Radio City Music Hall. Even though Metric has been together for 10 years now, they still seem to be a new band and have become successful on their own terms. For Haines, the amount of what this band achieved so far (highlights include playing Madison Square Garden on a bill with the Rolling Stones, winning Juno Awards, and selling platinum and gold records in Canada) has been both a surprise and yet not a surprise.

“There’s a constant sense of gratitude because we have no option,” she says. “We have to do this–this is what has to happen. We would be doing it if we’re still playing in clubs to 20 people. At the same time, part of me feels like, ‘God, I should hope so,’ having sacrificed a lot, and given really all of our love, time, money, energy and everything we could summon — we thrown it in the pot. I feel like we’re a new band in a way. We feel invigorated. Whatever it is, we certainly feel lucky to be able to do this.”


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