Port Of Morrow The Shins

• 1The Rifle's Spiral03:30
• 2Simple Song04:16
• 3It's Only Life04:02
• 4Bait And Switch03:24
• 5September03:34
• 6No Way Down03:16
• 7For A Fool03:57
• 8Fall Of '8203:49
• 940 Mark Strasse04:39
• 10Port Of Morrow05:50
• Total Runtime40:17

Info for Port Of Morrow

Port of Morrow, the fourth album from The Shins, was recorded in Los Angeles and Portland over the course of 2011 with James Mercer as usual handling all songwriting duties, lead vocals and the majority of instrumentation. The record was produced by Greg Kurstin and mixed by Rich Costey. The cover art was created by Jacob Escobedo.

"Arriving five years after Wincing the Night Away, Port of Morrow was the first Shins album to appear on James Mercer's Aural Apothecary imprint (also home to Broken Bells, his collaboration with Danger Mouse) and the first without the rest of the band that appeared on the remainder of their discography. Instead, Mercer assembled a revolving cast of supporting performers that included Modest Mouse's Joe Plummer, Crystal Skulls' Yuuki Matthews, drummer-at-large Janet Weiss, and producer Greg Kurstin, who gives the album a big, radio-friendly sound. There's no pretense of democracy nor of being "indie" here, things that might be easier to decry if these weren't some of Mercer's best songs since Chutes Too Narrow. Though there's no core band, Port of Morrow feels more focused than Wincing the Night Away even as Mercer departs from the Shins' classic sound. "The Rifle's Spiral" begins the album with keyboards that bounce and bubble everywhere, suggesting some of Broken Bells' influence has rubbed off, but the contrast between sweet vocals and barbed words ("you were always to be a dagger floating straight to their heart") that has been a key element since Oh, Inverted World is present and accounted for. Later, "Simple Song" feels downright triumphant, with big, airy bridges, a surprising minor-key chord change, and frantic guitar solos all coated in pop gloss. Mercer goes farther afield as Port of Morrow progresses, flirting with '70s soft rock on "For a Fool," while the title track is equal parts trippy and torchy, pairing a slinky falsetto with some of the album's most arresting imagery ("there are flowers in the garbage and a skull under your curls"). Consciously or not, Mercer channels classic singer/songwriters and members of famed bands gone solo on some of Port of Morrow's highlights: "Fall of '82" is as wordy, bouncy, and catchy as Billy Joel at his peak, while "It's Only Life"'s charming melody and message to take it easy make it the distant cousin of John Lennon's "Watching the Wheels." Enough of the album finds Mercer expanding and experimenting that when "Bait and Switch," which sounds like a lost Oh, Inverted World track transplanted to much fancier digs, or the Chutes Too Narrow-like rumination "September" pops up, it's almost startling. These are some of Mercer's most wide-ranging songs with any of his projects, to the point where it might be a little disingenuous to call this a Shins album, and slightly disappointing for any fans who had invested in them being a band rather than a James Mercer vehicle. Questions of semantics and authenticity aside, Port of Morrow's songs are compelling enough to keep most fans listening and enjoying." (Heather Phares, AMG)

The Shins

The Shins
are an American indie rock band founded and fronted by vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, James Mercer. The Shins were formed in Albuquerque, New Mexico, but are now based in Portland, Oregon.

The Shins began in 1996 as a side project for singer/songwriter James Mercer, whose primary band was Flake Music in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Mercer formed Flake Music in 1992 with Neal Langford on guitar, Phil Higgs and then Marty Crandall on bass, and Jesse Sandoval on drums. During the next 5 years Flake Music released several singles, a full-length album, and began touring largely due to the help of other bands like Modest Mouse.

In 1996, Mercer began writing what would eventually become The Shins' first record. Flake Music came to an end around this time leaving Mercer with an opportunity to record, "Nature Bears A Vacuum" a 7" EP released by Omnibus Records. For their earliest shows, The Shins performed as a duo with Mercer recruiting Sandoval to play drums. "Nature Bears A Vacuum" was released with no expectations of expanding the band's following beyond Albuquerque. However, the single generated enough attention that Mercer felt it necessary to assemble a full band. Crandall was brought into the fold on keyboards, and Dave Hernandez (frontman of local punk legends Scared of Chaka, which had played dozens of shows with Flake Music) was given bass duties.

At a San Francisco performance with Modest Mouse in 2000, Sub Pop's Jonathan Poneman asked The Shins to contribute a single to the label's Single of the Month Club, which eventually became an offer to release The Shins' 2001 single, "New Slang", and their debut album, "Oh, Inverted World". The group spent the rest of the year touring. The release of singles such as "Know Your Onion!" and "The Past and Pending" kept The Shins' success going into 2002, cementing "Oh, Inverted World" as one of the definitive indie-rock albums of the early '00s and The Shins as one of the genre's leading younger bands. It received critical acclaim for its lyrically deft and jangly pop sound. The song "One By One All Day" was featured in the 2003 film A Guy Thing, starring Jason Lee. Two other songs from this album, ("Caring Is Creepy" and "New Slang") were featured prominently on the soundtrack for the 2004 film Garden State, starring and directed by Zach Braff, exposing the music of The Shins to a much wider audience.[2] Their music was also featured in the television series The OC, the film The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie and they performed on an episode of Gilmore Girls. Oh, Inverted World appeared at #71 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of 2000–2004.

The band relocated from Albuquerque to Portland, OR in 2001. Mercer, Sandoval and Crandall made the move. Neal Langford decided to leave the band, staying in Albuquerque so he could continue with another of his passions, professional hot air ballooning. Dave Hernandez (at this point living in nearby Seattle) rejoined The Shins in 2003 playing guitar and bass. The band began tracking new material in Mercer's basement that summer. In an effort to balance the home-recording method used on Oh, Inverted World with a studio finish, producer Phil Ek (Built To Spill, Modest Mouse) was brought in to mix and produce the album. Chutes Too Narrow was released by Sub Pop in the fall of 2003 to much fanfare in indie music circles, featuring even more multi-layered lyrics, as well as a musical approach that explored new genres, song structures, and levels of production fidelity. In 2006, the band helped to curate an edition of the British All Tomorrow's Parties festival. Nonstop touring of everywhere from Australia to Norway, as well as the US countless times over contributed to pushing sales past 500,000 worldwide, exceeding everyone's expectations, including the band's. Chutes Too Narrow appeared at #47 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of 2000–2004.

An enhanced single release in 2004 included a live version of "New Slang" recorded with Iron and Wine, a studio mix of "Fighting in a Sack," a multimedia tack of "So Says I," and a cover of the Marc Bolan song "Baby Boomerang". The Shins have also recorded a cover of "We Will Become Silhouettes" by The Postal Service, which was released on that group's 2003 single "Such Great Heights". On May 9, 2005, the video for "Pink Bullets" (directed by Adam Bizanski), was one of the first videos to demonstrate iTunes music store's new capability to sell videos.

In a Pitchfork Media interview, Mercer announced that Eric Johnson of fellow Sub Pop band Fruit Bats had joined the Shins.

The band's third album, Wincing the Night Away, was recorded in Portland during 2006 by a largely solo Mercer, but with the production assistance of Joe Chiccarelli.[6] It was released on January 23, 2007 and debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200 album chart with 118,000 copies sold in its first week, the highest sales week and chart position an album released solely on Sub Pop has ever achieved. The album was leaked to the Internet on October 20, 2006 and was available for pre-order on iTunes, with an extra track.[citation needed] It was nominated for a 2008 Grammy award in the category of Best Alternative Music Album.

In 2007 the band did a Take-Away show acoustic video session shot by Vincent Moon, and recorded a version of "Little Boxes" for the Showtime series Weeds.[citation needed] On November 27, 2007, the group was featured on a Darfur charity album released by Waxploitation.

On January 24, 2008, "The Past and Pending" was played at the funeral of Heath Ledger.

After a year as this lineup, during which half the songs on debut album "Oh, Inverted World" (including "New Slang") were penned, Hernandez moved to New York City. Neal Langford was selected as his replacement, and it was this lineup that saw the group embark on a tour with Modest Mouse.

On June 20, 2008, the band announced that their three record Sub Pop contract had been fulfilled and that the next Shins' record would be released on James Mercer's own label, Aural Apothecary. On July 26th, 2011, the band announced via Facebook that they would soon release news about upcoming shows and new music.

On August 1, 2011 Pitchfork reported that The Shins would be releasing an album in 2012 on Mercer's Aural Apothecary Label, via Columbia Records. The Shins also announced additional tour dates for their North American tour. The new band backing Mercer on this tour include singer/songwriter Richard Swift, Modest Mouse drummer Joe Plummer, Yuuki Matthews of Crystal Skulls and Jessica Dobson. On December 14th, they announced on their website that their upcoming album would be titled Port of Morrow and would be released March 2012. They revealed the cover art for the album as well, designed by Jacob Escobedo. They also released their first track form the new album "Simple Song" on January 9th.

This album contains no booklet.