Destroyer: Daniel Bejar (vocals, acoustic & electric guitars, whistle, keyboards, synthesizer, percussion); Nicholas Bragg (guitar, E-bow, trumpet, piano, organ, cymbals); Chris Frey (E-bow, keyboards, bass, background vocals); Fisher Rose (violin, piano, synthesizer, vibraphone, drums, percussion).
Personnel: Daniel Bejar (vocals, acoustic guitar, slide whistle, melodica, piano, organ, synthesizer, percussion); Chris Frey (vocals, E-bow, melodica); Fisher Rose (vocals, violin, piano, synthesizer, vibraphone, drums, percussion); Steve Wood (E-bow).
Audio Mixers: Colin Stewart; Destroyer ; JC/DC; Steve Wood .
Recording information: IHOJ (2002); The Hive, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (2002).
Photographer: Sydney Vermont.
Most people first became aware of Dan Bejar as the George Harrison to Carl Newman's Lennon and McCartney in the Vancouver indie rock supergroup the New Pornographers, for which he's written and sung fan favorites such as "Jackie Dressed In Cobras." However, Bejar's work as the leader--and often sole member--of the considerably more artsy Destroyer predates his tenure in the New Pornographers by several years, and is where his talents truly bloom. He signed to the higher-profile American label Merge Records for the fifth Destroyer album, and THIS NIGHT is Bejar's finest and most self-assured work to date. Building on the successes of its concept-album predecessor, STREETHAWK: A SEDUCTION, it is less bombastic but somehow more ambitious. Bejar's quirky vocal style, a vibrato-heavy croon with strong echoes of such glam era heroes as Marc Bolan and Steve Harley, is here matched to arrangements consciously inspired by the cabaret-folk of David Bowie's HUNKY DORY. Resulting songs like "The Chosen Few" and "Snow White" are the consummate marriage of modern-day indie rock and vintage 1970s glam.
