{"id":270793,"date":"2026-06-18T13:12:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T13:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/270793\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T13:12:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T13:12:14","slug":"ben-gibbard-on-running-through-new-york-city-death-cab-for-cutie-and-letting-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/270793\/","title":{"rendered":"Ben Gibbard on Running Through New York City, Death Cab for Cutie, and Letting Go"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Estimated9 min read<\/p>\n

BEN GIBBARD EMERGES from the elevator bank at precisely 8 a.m., because he is never late. The Death Cab for Cutie front man is wearing gray running shorts and Wayfarers because, you see, Ben Gibbard is a runner. Has been for two decades. Gibbard is known for pushing himself to the absolute limit as a songwriter\u2014recently telling The New Yorker<\/a> that one of his biggest fears is \u201closing my edge,\u201d that \u201cif I stop writing\u2026I\u2019ll die, you know?\u201d And running might actually fit into this equation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I push myself physically, that will benefit how I push myself mentally,\u201d he says, while looking directly into my eyes. We shake hands. \u201cIt sounds kind of like a cheesy woo-woo thing, but the mind-body connection\u2026it\u2019s true.\u201d (Soul Meets Body<\/a>, perhaps?)<\/p>\n

We\u2019re in the lobby of The Bowery Hotel in Lower Manhattan. I let him know the truth: I am not a runner. This might be embarrassing. Perhaps I\u2019m honest so quickly because of the warmth of his hand and the smiling, casual ease of his presence. He\u2019s taller than I imagined. Let\u2019s be real, I already know it\u2019s really because his music\u2014consistent in my rotation since I discovered it more than two decades ago\u2014has always felt honest with me. And it\u2019s particularly honest in I Built You a Tower, the band\u2019s latest record. It dropped earlier this month. And today, we\u2019re going on a run to talk about it.<\/p>\n

Gibbard leads the way as we walk outside and onto the sidewalk. He\u2019s planned our route, a run that will take us to a few landmarks significant to New York writers and musicians. He takes a couple of big steps to start\u2014his legs are long, his calves defined, the exact type of physique you\u2019d expect from a runner. Hand on one hip, he looks up, stretching one way, then the other. It\u2019s a sunny, clear morning, save for a few Simpsons-esque clouds<\/a>. It\u2019s also early, a few minutes past 8 a.m. I haven\u2019t been awake and in Manhattan this early since I lived there more than a decade ago. Gibbard lifts his wrist, elbow bent, and taps his large fitness watch, a Suunto Vertical, before we begin our workout.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you run across the middle of an intersection?\u201d he asks as we\u2019re about to get started. Theoretically, yes, I would. In practice? Anyone\u2019s call.<\/p>\n

GIBBARD IS BEST known as the lead vocalist and guitarist for Death Cab for Cutie, which formed in Bellham, Washington, in 1997. He grew up in the state and remains based in Seattle. In the early aughts, Death Cab for Cutie (Death Cab, if you\u2019re a fan), featuring Gibbard\u2019s sensitive songwriting and transparent melancholy, rocketed to fame squarely in the middle of the Venn diagram of indie, emo, and rock. It\u2019s not an overstatement to say that his music, both with Death Cab and pop-electronic group The Postal Service, remains foundational to millennials and Gen X\u2019ers on a molecular level. On I Built You a Tower, the band recaptures the vibe for a generation, who, like the singer himself, might be feeling a little older and a lot wiser.<\/p>\n

Gibbard\u2019s path to running started on the elliptical. In 2007, he realized he should start going to the gym, and he wanted to start easy. One day, he found himself watching someone running on a treadmill. I wonder if I could run two miles, he thought. One thing led to another, and in 2011, he ran his first marathon. \u201cI\u2019ve never understood half-measures, which is probably to my detriment,\u201d he tells me. These days, Gibbard toggles back and forth between solo running deep in the mountains, in silence, and running with friends.<\/p>\n

\"Death<\/p>\n

Rolling Stone\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

On the street, I\u2019d assumed we\u2019d ease into things with a warmup. A walking warmup. But I\u2019m following Gibbard\u2019s lead, and we enter a full-on jog just a few steps away from the hotel. I panic. How will I refer to all my notes? Will I remember to ask all the questions I prepared? Am I running too slow? Am I embarrassing myself in front of Ben Gibbard, front man of Death Cab for Cutie? I\u2019ve walked and talked plenty. But I\u2019ve never ran and talked in my normal life, let alone when I\u2019m working. Maybe Aaron Sorkin<\/a> should try this.\u2026<\/p>\n

The panic is fleeting, like a bolt of lightning with no consequences. Unlike with most celebrities I\u2019ve interviewed\u2014usually sitting still and on a Zoom call, for the record\u2014it doesn\u2019t take much to get Gibbard to talk.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m excited to finally get [I Built You a Tower] out in the world,\u201d he says, mid-pace. His breathing is normal. \u201cI feel creatively blocked in the period between finishing a record and starting a new one. I can\u2019t really write until the record\u2019s out. It\u2019s like I have to birth the record first before I can start thinking about new songs. It\u2019s like I can\u2019t move forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

We slow down for our first stop: 431 East 12th Street, a pre-war building with a warm brick exterior and intricate white engravings framing the windows. \u201cAllen Ginsberg had an apartment on the fifth floor,\u201d he says with a smile. \u201cThere\u2019s a famous photograph he took<\/a> of Jack Kerouac smoking a cigarette, looking off in that direction, which I have on my wall at home. This is why I love doing this shit. I love going by a place, and you think, Who lives there now?\u201d <\/p>\n

GIBBARD HAS ALWAYS been a romantic. Whenever he\u2019s reading a book and an address is mentioned, he looks it up on Google Maps and pins it. The next time he\u2019s in that city, he plans a run to it. \u201cI love this idea that people made brilliant work in these locations in the same way that when I buy an old instrument, I think about who owned it beforehand, and for what purpose,\u201d he says. \u201cI just like to dream on that stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Running south down Avenue A, Gibbard asks how old I was when I started listening to Death Cab. Again, I tell him the truth: I was 14 and discovered their music the way most people my age did: watching The O.C. The track \u201cA Lack of Color\u201d appeared on The O.C. Mix 1, the first soundtrack released for the hit Fox teen soap, which premiered two months before the band\u2019s breakthrough album, Transatlanticism, was released. Throughout that fall\u2019s episodes, the main character Seth Cohen (Adam Brody) name-dropped Death Cab for Cutie<\/a>. In one episode, he even wore a T-shirt. In the memorable 2003 episode \u201cThe Best Chrismukkah Ever,\u201d Seth gifts Summer and Anna, the two women pining for him, each a Transatlanticism CD. It\u2019s seen as one of the show\u2019s most iconic moments and helped catapult Death Cab into the mainstream.<\/p>\n

Gibbard has always been a romantic. Whenever he\u2019s reading a book and an address is mentioned, he looks it up on Google Maps and pins it.<\/p>\n

While we wait to cross the street, he raises a pointing finger. \u201cWhen we made Transatlanticism and The O.C. was popping off, we went from playing there to playing Roseland Ballroom<\/a> or whatever.\u201d He\u2019s pointing at Mercury Lounge on Houston Street. \u201cWe went from being this secret band, and the people who come to shows looked a lot like us\u2014and we might even stay at their houses afterwards\u2014to playing much larger places and for a more diverse audience culturally. I did feel this pressure,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople were like, How are they going to follow this up?\u201d<\/p>\n

Somewhere along the way, Gibbard let that pressure go. \u201cIt\u2019s a rather liberating feeling to know we\u2019re never going to make a record again that\u2019s going to have that impact,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is not that serious. You know? I\u2019m gonna make a lot of records in my life. Just have fun with this. We\u2019re gonna do our best and it\u2019s gonna be what it\u2019s gonna be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back on the road, Gibbard notices me struggling to breathe. \u201cYou\u2019re doing great,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019re conversational.\u201d I certainly don\u2019t think I\u2019m talking normally. But at least Gibbard\u2014who wrote 2005\u2019s Plans, the album that lived rent-free in the CD player I had installed in my car in high school\u2014thinks I\u2019m doing a good job.<\/p>\n

He interrupts himself in the middle of telling me about his morning routine (he rises at 5:30 a.m. every morning).<\/p>\n

\u201c56 Ludlow,\u201d he says, as we pull up to another brick pre-war with black iron fire escapes. It\u2019s similar to Ginsberg\u2019s building but with fewer details. \u201cRight here. Lou Reed and John Cale shared an apartment in this building. They did low-rent recordings here, where they postmarked the tape of the songs and then mailed it to themselves. \u2018Waiting for My Man,\u2019 \u2018Heroin,\u2019 songs like that. And they lived there. Incredible. It\u2019s just crazy to think of those two weirdos living in that apartment together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back to that morning routine. After getting up in the morning, Gibbard says, he puts on a record, because there\u2019s always a record playing in his house. Then he gets \u201csuper caffeinated\u201d via a carafe of pour-over coffee. He reads the news and says he starts \u201cblowing up\u201d his group texts, reacting, he says, to the aforementioned events \u201cwith various versions of Would you fucking believe what this guy did last night.\u2026 And at some point, I\u2019m like, it\u2019s time to rage run or whatever.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Ben<\/p>\n

Ryan Thrower<\/p>\n

Despite the passage of time, Gibbard\u2019s older projects have remained close. In 2023, Death Cab and The Postal Service went on a reunion tour. Death Cab played Transatlanticism from start to finish, then The Postal Service played Give Up from start to finish. Last year, Death Cab did a reunion tour for Plans, in honor of its 20th anniversary.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the business side of things, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s controversial to say that streaming is fucking all of us,\u201d Gibbard says when I ask about the reunion shows. \u201cUnless you\u2019re Taylor Swift or Post Malone, you\u2019re kind of getting screwed.\u201d He\u2019d seen other musicians going on special tours to promote their own iconic work. He watched The Cure perform Disintegration, and he saw Liz Phair\u2014whom he \u201ccrushed out on\u201d as a teenager\u2014perform Exile in Guyville. \u201cEven if I wanted to write those songs again, I really couldn\u2019t,\u201d he explains. \u201cSo for me, it was more about re-creating the process than rewriting songs.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have made an unbelievable living for myself,\u201d he says. \u201cI think it’s safe to say that barring some unforeseen tragedy, I will probably not have to worry about money for the rest of my life.\u201d He shifts the weight in his feet back and forth while we wait to cross the street. \u201cI find myself asking the question often: Do we not have enough? Especially people who are already wealthy in the entertainment industry. I just have to release that record for the fourth time, a different color vinyl this time. Do we have to? It just seems kind of gross and cash-grabbing.\u201d<\/p>\n

WE STOP IN front of a run-down building at 112 Chambers Street. \u201cWhen Yoko Ono first moved to New York, her loft was in this building,\u201d Gibbard explains. His face is inquisitive but solemn.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the only building on this little tour that looks like it\u2019s still kind of slummy,\u201d he says. \u201cArtists create the culture. Artists are the magnet. They\u2019re the people who make people want to live in a place. And then money comes in and ruins it. I was under the false impression\u2014I was naive\u2014to think that people wouldn\u2019t want to move to Seattle because it was gray and rainy and dark seven months a year. But behold, they sit in the dark room and code, have all their meals delivered, play video games, and just watch porn all day. They\u2019re not that concerned with the weather.\u201d<\/p>\n

We breeze past a brand-spanking-new Sephora on the corner of Third Avenue and St. Marks.<\/p>\n

\u201cFour miles. We\u2019ve got one left,\u201d he says, just as I\u2019m starting to think that I don\u2019t want this conversation to end. I\u2019m warmed up. \u201cYou\u2019re doing great.\u201d<\/p>\n

We make it back to the dark, raging-hot Bowery Hotel lobby, its multiple fireplaces roaring. The band\u2019s publicist greets us with ice-cold bottles of water\u2014success has its perks\u2014before leaving us alone to chat.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s clear that Gibbard feels comfortable, and for him, our talk is no new thing. \u201cWhat\u2019s said on the trail stays on the trail. I have friends I know through running, and we know the details of each other\u2019s lives,\u201d he says. \u201cWe don\u2019t know each other, but at the same time, we\u2019re talking like we\u2019re old friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buy I Built You A Tower on Vinyl Here<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Play\"Video\"Headshot<\/p>\n

Carrie is a Brooklyn-based entertainment journalist and critic with bylines in GQ, The Ringer, Vulture, The Cut, and more. She tweets way too much @carriesnotscary.<\/p>\n