Tegan And Sara Battle Their Labels

02/10/09 2:39pm

by Alyssa Noel (CHARTattack)

They've just released their fifth album, but Canada's favourite twins can't escape the same dumb questions

Tegan And Sara are an easy sell.

Few bands possess even one or two hype-worthy characteristics to help them stand out from the pack. But the cute lesbian twin sisters with a penchant for speaking their minds are drowning in a sea of publicity angles.

And after nine years of answering such inane interview questions as, "What's it like to be a twin sister?" they would be more than happy to blend in a little.

"It just seems so boring and redundant that article after article after article is about the same stupid things," says Tegan Quin, perched on a chair inside the Vancouver East Cultural Centre where she'll perform later that night. "It's like writers see 85 stories online about those exact same things and they're like, 'What does being a lesbian have to do with being a twin?' And it's like, 'Are you serious? Why are you bothering doing the interview? Why not just cut and paste the article?' But I think now I'm starting to get to a point where I'm like, 'Cool. That's just the way it goes.'"

The curious thing about these unwanted labels is that none of them are evident in the Quin sisters' music. Tegan and Sara don't sing about life as cute lesbian twins, they sing overwhelmingly about a much more universal experience: falling in and out of love.

On their fifth album, The Con, they haven't strayed from that theme. But they've approached it as 26-year-olds who, musically, have matured exponentially since 2004's So Jealous. Where once there were hook-laden pop songs that should've been in high rotation on FM radio, there now sit more complex gems that play with electronics ("Are You Ten Years Ago"), multi-layered vocals ("I Was Married") and peppy piano chords ("Back In Your Head"). Producer Chris Walla of Death Cab For Cutie helped give them confidence to venture beyond their usual sound, says Tegan. They recorded the album in Walla's basement in Portland, Oregon.

"He encouraged us and was excited," she says. "He was like, 'You want to layer 11 different guitars, fine. Let's do it. You want to put a triplet of your vocal and then have all this extra background noise? It's not conventional, but it sounded good on the demo, and I liked that.' I never questioned anything we were doing because Chris seemed to think it was OK and we respect him so much."

Following the parade of noteworthy bands who are releasing deluxe editions of their albums (think Arcade Fire's cartoon flip book or Bright Eyes' picture decoder), presumably to curb downloading, Tegan And Sara have also included a DVD in their latest package. But unlike the aforementioned Cracker Jack prizes, Tegan vows that fans won't be disappointed. She might be right,
considering the set for this film is a homemade forest and interviews take shape in the form of intimate phone conversations.

"So often now you'll see 'buy the exclusive DVD deluxe package' and it's two crappy music videos and a grainy interview and you're like, 'I got ripped off. I paid four extra bucks for this?' When we decided we were going to do a DVD, we were going to go all-out," she says.

And that, arguably, is the most important label Tegan And Sara have earned: musicians who go "all out" to entertain. After their first show for The Con tour in Victoria, a young boy approached Sara to tell her he'd been to more than 12 of their shows and appreciated the unrehearsed between-song-banter that make the performances unique.

"We really try every night," she says. "There's not one night where I walk on stage that I don't think, 'How do I make this audience feel like tonight is for them and it's special?'"

bonus sidebar
Four Facts About The Making Of The Con

1) Tegan And Sara pulled a red wagon full of video equipment to producer Chris Walla's basement studio every day during recording.

2) Angela Kendall, filmmaker of the bonus DVD included in the deluxe edition of the album, is a good friend of Tegan And Sara. They say they wouldn't have opened up the way they did if she hadn't been behind the camera.

3) Matt Sharp from The Rentals and Weezer played bass on Sara's songs while Hunter Burgan of AFI played on Tegan's. Jason McGerr from Death Cab For Cutie played drums throughout.

4) After wrapping up the record in March, Tegan went to Hawaii in search of Dog The Bounty Hunter (according to their website bio).

The following feature article is from the September 2007 issue of Chart Magazine. To purchase the issue go to the Chart Shop.