Over the past 15 years, Jessica Dobson has dedicated her Deep Sea Diver project to standing out among an ever-widening field of indie-rock outfits in her native Pacific Northwest and beyond. Joined by drummer Peter Mansen and synth player Elliot Jackson, the outfit’s fourth album Billboard Heart feels like their most intuitive—it’s the work of road-tested musicians following their instincts, fueled as much by the music they consume as by each other. “Sometimes we need reminders to not take ourselves seriously and the good stuff comes out,” Dobson shares in the band’s breakdown of the LP, signaling the more carefree rock-and-roll feel of their Sub Pop debut in contrast with 2020’s folkier Impossible Weight.
Joined by her partner Mansen in the track-by-track writeup, the duo cite everything from the urgency of The Walkmen to Tom Skinner’s specific percussional tones on the first LP from The Smile, the tight post-punk energy of Gang of Four to the improvisatory looseness of Wilco’s Summerteeth (not to mention the indirect influences of David Bazan’s bookshelf and Pearl Jam’s arena-sized audiences to which Deep Sea Diver recently played). Billboard Heart is clearly the work of artists fully unclenching for the first time, a cathartic second take when the first one may have been a little overthought. “Sometimes you have to be willing to demolish what you think is precious to get to the better stuff,” Manson notes, echoing Dobson’s earlier sentiment.
With the record out today, stream along below as Deep Sea Diver break the whole thing down track by track. The band will also be embarking on a headlining tour a month from now, kicking things off in their home state of Washington—check out their full list of dates here.
1. “Billboard Heart”
Peter: “Billboard Heart” was written after a fight between Jessica and I. We were trying to write and nothing useful was coming out and we began bickering and I left in a huff and she continued playing. From upstairs, I immediately felt the energy change in the house, and what Jessica started playing was so inspired—every note for about an hour and a half. My jaw was on the floor as she was creating puzzle pieces out of thin air and everything just worked—almost like a miracle. Some songs have natures—like people—and the song “Billboard Heart” was extremely giving through the whole process. Anything we tried worked—any noise, any experiment. In the studio, we jammed the outro for five minutes and it felt good the entire time. Making the video was the same, everything about the song was generous.
2. “What Do I Know”
Jessica: This is the first song where I recorded almost everything in my home studio. I was listening to a lot of The Smile’s first album and was inspired by the drum sounds, so I rented a couple microphones and went to town. Everything about this song made most sense when it wasn’t overthought. Gut impulses and first takes were usually key to capturing the free spirited punk energy. While writing the song, Peter told me to play the dumbest thing I could think of—and I started playing a little musical noodle that’s now one of my favorite guitar parts on the album. Sometimes we need reminders to not take ourselves seriously and the good stuff comes out.
3. “Emergency”
Jessica: This is our unabashed rock song. I was messing around with my pedals one day and mindlessly playing guitar and this little lightning bolt riff came out. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but it was discovered about a year later on an iPhone video. We really leaned into our love for Gang of Four and the frenetic energy of a lot of Walkmen songs for this one. It had to feel urgent. I love the squelchy synth sounds that Elliot played on this one. There are certain songs where the essence is the lyric, or the vibe, or the instrumentation, and some where the essence is the riff. This song is about the riff, and it needed to be turned up to 11. I actually had a pedal designed, and from that pedal we recorded the craziest and most chaotic guitar parts on the song.
4. “Shovel”
Jessica: I ran into Dave Bazan from Pedro the Lion at a coffee shop and he recommended a book called Writing Better Lyrics. At first I thought, “The author should’ve read a book called ‘writing better book titles,’“ but it unlocked something in me and freed me up to write lyrics more freely. “Shovel” came out of a writing exercise that I showed to Peter, and he was so moved by it he was in tears. We wrote and demoed the song immediately and it was filled with noisy guitars, drum machines, and raw emotion. Peter had the premonition that we’d play it in arenas—and a few months later we were road testing it in arenas opening for Pearl Jam before finally recording it in the studio.
5. “Tiny Threads”
Jessica: I think this is my favorite song on the album. It felt like a mysterious spark from the get-go, like a kind of voodoo. We didn’t know what to do with it for about a year, but resurrected it and it was pure magic. There are some songs that feel alive, and this one feels like it has its own spirit. And it didn’t allow for much—many of the overdubs or parts that we tried to write for it to layer it made the song feel awful—but it was mostly in taking away that it felt the best.
6. “Loose Change”
Jessica: Most of what exists here was my first demo of the song. We tried re-recording it two times in two different studios, but this one had the energy. Nothing is perfect about it—notes are bent this way and that, mostly first takes of ideas set down in real time in the moment of inspiration and just feeling the warmth of the sounds coming out—and that’s the feeling that the song needed: no perfectionism, but a warmth. I love the sounds at the end of the track where I was inspired by Wilco’s Summer Teeth where little noises and transitions add to the world of the album—and mistakes. Blips and bloops become the paints, colors, and textures that feel almost like a painting.
7. “Always Waving Goodbye”
Peter: I showed up to the studio to track drums for a song we had mostly recorded, and when I arrived, Andy and Jessica told me that they’d demolished the song and only kept the lyric “I’m always waving goodbye.” I remember loving the original version, but trusted them so deeply by this point in the recording that I just said “Great, let’s do it!” We took a bulldozer to it—then smashed it with a wrecking ball. And we’re left with a magical pop song with maybe the most searing guitar solo on the record. Sometimes you have to be willing to demolish what you think is precious to get to the better stuff.
8. “Let Me Go”
Jessica: I invited my friend Madison Cunningham to Seattle to hang out for a weekend and play music and try writing a song together. I love her and her sensibilities, guitar playing, and songwriting. After attempting a few ideas, nothing was really revealing itself and we resigned ourselves to the fact that it wasn’t in the cards this time. But when I started playing an old riff that I wrote in high school, Madison joined me and out came this dark, jangly ballad. My co- producer Andy Park brought out an old drum machine, Peter started playing synth, and the song took shape immediately. The structure presented itself pretty fully formed and we were able to write lyrics to it the next day. A gift of a song that I’m so glad we kept pushing forward without expectations.
9. “Be Sweet”
Jessica: Sometimes I book shows for myself so that I keep myself writing new songs. It provides deadlines for me to actually commit to ideas. I wrote this song for one of those shows and felt such a sweetness with this one—that’s not a common emotion for me to write out of. I recorded most of the instruments in my studio and once again allowed myself the great privilege of not being precious.
10. “See in the Dark”
Peter: Jessica and I have a writing exercise where we each get an hour to dictate what goes on in that particular hour. The entire song was written immediately, and carries a strange and mysterious energy that kept us captivated throughout the process of developing it. It has a power live, where even upon people hearing it for the first time, audiences start moshing. I’d certainly forgotten about moshing until we played this song.
11. “Happiness Is Not a Given”
Jessica: This song was the most magical moment of the entire process. We showed up to the studio with a chorus idea, some voice memos, and a posture of openness and we were given one of my favorite musical gifts of all time. It accepted anything we threw at it. It gives me wild chills of electricity when listening back each time. And it’s the fullest embodiment of the main themes of our album: freedom, playfulness, pursuing of instinct, darkness and light, and a deep, melancholic longing for beauty and wholeness.
