#14: Broken Bells, "The High Road"

Scene – the Roskilde Festival in Denmark, 2004.

A man sits alone, enjoying a Carlsberg lager. He is listening not to the music of the festival, but a recently released album called The Grey Album, a mashup consisting of vocals from Jay-Z’s The Black Album and music from the Beatles self-titled album, better known as The White Album. The album has quickly risen to prominence, in part because of record label EMI’s attempt to halt its distribution and in part because it is the creation of an unknown artist known only as Danger Mouse.

Enters a young songwriter and producer named Brian Burton. He recognizes the man sitting alone.

Burton: “Excuse me, sorry to interrupt, but you’re James Mercer, right?”

Mercer: “Indeed, I am.”

Burton: “I just wanted to say that I’m a fan of your band, The Shins. Big fan.”

Mercer: “That’s nice of you to say.”

Burton: “I see you’re listening to The Grey Album.”

Mercer: “Have you heard it? I wish I knew who this Danger Mouse guy is.”

Burton: “You’re not signed to EMI, are you?”

Mercer: “No. Why?”

Burton: “Because that’s me.”

End scene.

The relationship between James Mercer and Danger Mouse, the duo that compromise Broken Bells, probably didn’t start exactly in that manner, but let’s just assume it’s not that far off. It took another five years before Mercer and Burton would turn their mutual respect into music, but that is what they did.

The combination of the introverted Mercer and the mad man Burton makes little sense at first blush. And even less on second thought. But the duo works because both men are pop-science nerds capable of finding the middle ground, willing to experiment outside of their own comfort levels until they find something common within each other, because “they know, and so do I/The high road is hard to find.”

The State of the Hype Machine Union: http://hypem.com/#!/search/the%20high%20road/1/.

Video won’t let you down, but it’s still down there.