Of course there has always been a strong romantic theme to The Dears songs, be it good or bad romance. On ‘To Hold and Have’, the fade-up-fade-out intro of swooning strings finally settles and a crooning Lightburn eases out a gorgeous melody over sweet violins and lilting guitars and the song is pure heartbreak. The rocking refrain is a monumental earworm of “Whose side are you on?” recalling Fleetwood Mac’s ‘The Chain’ in full throttle Formula One theme section. The section repeating “It’s not safe!” almost outstays its welcome before we go for the money shot. With a twitchy verse featuring flickering guitars, sub bass synths and irritable percussion, the track eschews regular song structures advantageously. It’s precisely at this moment I realise The Dears are back on form. It’s such a powerful moment when Lightburn challenges “Whose side are you on?” it grabs your attention immediately. The band go straight for the jugular with ‘I Used to Pray for the Heavens to Fall’, starting the song with a more restraint take on the song’s glorious refrain. What seems an introverted and edgy song explodes into a full blown myriad of instrumentation while Lightburn jumps in with his soulful yelp of “I never wanted to do this…alone”. Lightburn intones with serious intent “There was a warning” while choppy drums, ringing alarm guitars and squelchy electronics add some sci-fi menace.
Those fears were soon assuaged with warm-up opener ‘We Lost Everything’. So I didn’t have much expectation when I first pressed play to listen to Times Infinity Volume One. I didn’t find anything particularly memorable about 2008’s Missiles, or their last effort from 2011, Degeneration Street. The same can’t be said though for their recorded output in recent times. I managed to get along to one of their gigs when they toured the Gang of Losers album and to this day, it ranks very highly in the most memorable category. When my father passed away, it was one of Lightburn’s lines from ‘We Can Have It’, “You never said I’d see you again…You never said I will…I will” that gave me some strength at a very difficult time. Here was a unique collection of swooning heartbreak laden tunes delivered with the honeyed tones of Murray Lightburn, one of the most underrated vocalists of this generation, in my opinion. Montreal’s The Dears may have formed in 1995 but they only appeared on my radar in 2003 with their sublime second album No Cities Left.
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