With I Built You a Tower, Death Cab for Cutie defiantly launched a new chapter to the band nearly 30 years into their career. Lyrically inspired by Ben Gibbard’s reflections on the dissolution of his marriage and musically aligned with the urgency and maximalism of the group’s early peak, it’s perhaps most notable that this 11th album marks their first release on an indie label since Transatlanticism in 2003. Needless to say, Tower made the cut when we pared down our list of our favorite albums of the year so far to just 25 titles.
As an extension of our recent digital cover story on the band, guitarist Dave Depper and bassist Nick Harmer recorded a new episode of “Hacked” for us that gives us a sense of where their heads were at when the record came together. From classics by Prince and The Roches to recent releases by Boards of Canada and Westside Cowboy (and even a bit of metal, courtesy of Big|Brave), check out their picks every day this week (July 13 – 17) at 10 a.m., 1 p.m., 5 p.m., and 10 p.m. PT only on FLOOD FM.
