{"id":479392,"date":"2026-06-02T15:39:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T15:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/479392\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T15:39:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T15:39:10","slug":"death-cab-for-cutie-talk-new-album-anniversary-tours-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/479392\/","title":{"rendered":"Death Cab for Cutie Talk New Album, Anniversary Tours, More"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tBen Gibbard<\/a> was overwhelmed by his memories.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIt started a few years ago on the joint anniversary tour<\/a> that the Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie<\/a> put on to celebrate 20 years of Give Up<\/a> and Transatlanticism<\/a>. Each night, the frontman would travel back in time, tap into his 26-year-old self and deliver convincing, vulnerable performances. But offstage, Gibbard was finding it difficult to switch back and forth between the past and present as his personal life took a rough turn. The frontman was going through a separation from photographer Rachel Demy, who he married in 2016. By 2024, the couple filed for divorce.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was having to do a lot of compartmentalization,\u201d Gibbard, 49, tells Rolling Stone. He\u2019s sitting in the lobby of the Bowery Hotel, with Death Cab guitarist Dave Depper next to him. Gibbard sips on a hot Americano as he lays out the metaphor that helped him cope over the past few years. \u201cI started to just have these visions of my life as a skyline. It\u2019s like you\u2019re looking at it from an aerial. You can see all these different size buildings and they all house different memories,\u201d he says. \u201cThe memories of all those people, those times exist in the buildings and you can visit them, you can go open the door and say hello.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe idea for Death Cab\u2019s 11th studio album, I Built You a Tower was born out of that metaphor. \u201cIt\u2019s putting the wonderful memories and the very painful ones into this edifice, trying to lock the door from the outside,\u201d Gibbard says. \u201cIt\u2019s like, \u2018you stay in there, I can\u2019t have you out of that building,\u2019 but there\u2019s always a moment where they escape \u2026 even though you think you\u2019ve made an emotional break from that period or that time, it all kind of comes rushing back.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWith understated, melancholic melodies and gut-wrenching lyrics, I Built You a Tower details the cataclysmic experience of facing the past head-on \u2014 and the grief that comes with it. Over the course of 11 tracks, Gibbard and co detail everything from devastating heartbreak to hard-won acceptance, using every memory as a roadmap.<\/p>\n

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\n\tThat trajectory becomes apparent on the turning point of the LP, \u201cStone Over Water,\u201d which is out today ahead of the album\u2019s release on June 5. \u201cI\u2019m trying to hold it together,\u201d Gibbard admits over a quintessentially Death Cab drum beat before realizing, \u201cI can scream and shout \/ Or learn to live without.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI Built You a Tower marks Death Cab\u2019s first album since 2022\u2019s Asphalt Meadows<\/a>. Between releases, the band has experienced pivotal full-circle moments, the pendulum of time pushing them back into the past and informing their future. In 2023, they were on the road for the aforementioned anniversary tours, a Millennial nostalgia dream come true with so much demand that Death Cab extended their run with more dates. A year later, they found themselves leaving Atlantic Records, their major label home for the past two decades.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt almost comes as no surprise, then, that their new record is the first project in years where they\u2019ve managed to tap into the magic of early-aughts records like The Photo Album and Transatlanticism that transformed them from indie darlings into rock icons. \u201cI wanted to recreate the process of how I wrote those early songs,\u201d Gibbard says. \u201cBut hopefully with the emotional intelligence and skillset I\u2019ve developed as a songwriter at almost 50.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile making Asphalt Meadows, Gibbard began digitizing 4-track demo tapes from Death Cab\u2019s early years, uncovering instrumentals from the band\u2019s inception and reminding the frontman of his old writing process. \u201cThe songs that have resonated the best over the years have been the ones that are very transparent and emotionally honest and earnest. The times that I\u2019ve gotten away from that have been the songs of the records that haven\u2019t hit the same way,\u201d Gibbard says, making a point to name 2011\u2019s Codes and Keys in particular. At the time, he was living in Los Angeles and married to actress Zooey Deschanel. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to be as transparent and honest out of self-protection,\u201d he admits. \u201cThat is by far the least transparent, least emotionally resonant record that I think we ever made.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tBut playing an open-hearted record like Transatlanticism to a live audience every night showed Gibbard that Death Cab\u2019s vulnerability has always been their superpower. \u201cIt just made me realize that this is the resonant element of the band, this is the reason that there are 18,000 people at Madison Square Garden,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAs Death Cab takes inspiration from their past work, it\u2019s less about a nostalgia grab and more about using the energy behind that early music to revitalize them as a band. \u201cThose anniversary tours really cleared the slate for me,\u201d Depper says, who joined Death Cab in 2015. \u201cWe\u2019ve honored the past, but I want to imbue some of those feelings into what we\u2019re doing now.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tOne way Death Cab are honoring their past is by returning to an independent label for the first time in more than 20 years. \u201cWe initially had plans to do one more record with Atlantic,\u201d Gibbard says. But after a major shake-up at the label forced longtime chairman and COO Julie Greenwald out<\/a>, they changed courses. \u201cWe were like, \u2018We need to get the fuck out of here,\u2019\u2019 Gibbard says. Before she left, Greenwald even helped Death Cab get out of a newly minted contract, a move that he points to as \u201ca true testament to her and her dedication to this band, in the midst of her losing her job, she was willing to do what it took.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI Built You a Tower will be released under ANTI Records, Epitaph\u2019s sister label. For Death Cab, the return to an indie is a homecoming of sorts. \u201cIt felt so refreshing to be back in a room with people that were culturally of our world,\u201d Gibbard says, recalling the first meeting with Epitaph owner Brett Gurewitz and former head of A&R Alison Crutchfield. \u201cI can really count on one hand in the 20 years at Atlantic the number of people that we felt we had some true similar musical vocabulary\u201d he adds, \u201cIt feels like we\u2019ve landed back in a place that we feel very comfortable at.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDepper agrees. \u201cIt comes at a great time for us, like having sort of a tabula rasa moment after those anniversary tours,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m sure we would have made a great album with Atlantic again, but having this prism to focus this energy through in terms of releasing it, it just feels completely right.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tNearly 30 years after their inception, it\u2019s clear Death Cab have hit a whole new stride, proving time and time again the power of their resonant indie rock. But this fate never felt like it was in the cards for the band. Back in 2005, in an interview for the band\u2019s Plans<\/a> record following their mainstream rise, Gibbard told Rolling Stone<\/a>, \u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019m a pessimist for saying that I know for a fact that this band is not going to last forever and I\u2019m probably not going to be as successful doing music as I am now in 20 years. That\u2019s the reality and I\u2019d rather acknowledge it than dread it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tGibbard isn\u2019t surprised to hear that what he calls his \u201cfatalist nature\u201d was alive and well decades ago. \u201cI would rather prepare for the worst\u2026 I probably would give you a very similar answer now,\u201d he says with a laugh. Death Cab bassist Nick Harmer has even coined the term \u201cGibbard\u2019s wager\u201d to describe the frontman\u2019s betting style. Gibbard explains: \u201cWhen the Seattle Mariners were in the playoffs, I would bet on them to lose and then if they win, I would lose money, but I\u2019m happy, right? And if they lose, as I think they\u2019re going to do, I make money, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI, for one, am delighted you were wrong,\u201d Depper chimes in, raising his eyebrows.<\/p>\n

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\n\tAt this point, the coffee that remains in their cups has gone cold, and our time is almost up. Gibbard relents. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI never would have seen this. There\u2019s no fucking world that I think this would be my life,\u201d he says. \u201cThe longer I get to do this, the more grateful I am and the more locked in and the more focused I am. More than ever in my life, I feel the utmost responsibility to the catalog, to the fans, to make sure that we\u2019re not fucking around.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ben Gibbard was overwhelmed by his memories.\u00a0 It started a few years ago on the joint anniversary tour…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":479393,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[56418,56419,93,61,60,278],"class_list":["post-479392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-ben-gibbard","tag-death-cab-for-cutie","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=479392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/479393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=479392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=479392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=479392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}