Retrospective Reviews: Japandroid's "Celebration Rock"

We’re only two years removed from the release of Celebration Rock, the hook-laden sophomore record from Vancouver-based rockers Japandroids, but it’s tempting to suggest that it’s one of the great contemporary Canadian rock records, even if its sonic palette can hardly be described as contemporary. Released in 2012, the album, with its pop-punk choruses and dirty guitar riffs, was a bit of a sonic outlier in the Canadian music scene, at least when examining which acts were garnering attraction at home and abroad around the same time.

The late 2000’s and early 2010’s had seen a lot of Canadian rock bands, and a lot of musicians in general, turning towards more electronic-based music – synth pads and looped vocals were the calling card for bands like Braids and Grimes, two bands that garnered critical acclaim with Native Speaker and Geidi Primes respectively. Even Canada’s flagship indie rock bands were turning down, so to speak. Arcade Fire were getting less anthemic, Wolf Parade were essentially breaking up and making increasingly uninspired music, and Broken Social Scene were in no rush to go back to the reliable well of their collective art rock.

In some ways, then, Celebration Rock filled a void. Sure, there were plenty of Canadian bands playing great, straightforward rock and punk music in the late aughts, but few records sounded as urgent, as restless, and as honest as this one from Japandroids. Celebration Rock stands out because it takes a series of universalities and creates something personal, all while establishing and maintaining a breakneck pace that perfectly suits the oversized hooks and emotions that permeate the record. “Fire’s Highway” is about the life experiences that could have been and the lingering lust that keeps us up at night. “She’ll kiss away your gypsy fears/And turn some restless nights to restless years” shouts Brian King, an absorbing world-weariness in his strained vocal take. “Fire’s Highway” may be the best example of what this album is about, sonically and thematically. Furiously strummed, distorted electric guitar and a pummeling drum take from David Prowse soundtrack every tale of blurry nights and the hazy mornings after.

As much as Celebration Rock meditates on the missed opportunities of youth and the fear of getting old, this isn’t an album full of sadsack odes to better times, or some sort of rosy nostalgia for records that employed only guitars and drums. Instead, it’s an album that uses its glorious shout-along choruses and air guitar-ready grooves to embrace the frantic nature of life. The tip off is right there in the title of the album. This is a celebration, not a lamentation, of the connections we make in our lives and how they not only form some of our best years, but also linger on after they’ve run their course; and, perhaps most importantly, such lingering is to be cherished. Fear, regret, jealousy, love, rage; they’re all part of the human experience, and Celebration Rock wants you to know that it’s rewarding to feel every single one of them.

Kyle Fowle is a writer living in Toronto. He's on Twitter.