Nassau Pay Homage To Robert Pollard On New Album

Nassau frontman Jon McCann has perhaps the best known method of fighting writer's block — he calls his old Guided By Voices bandmate Robert Pollard.

"I find that thinking about the way he works, in the back of my head when I'm doing things, is good," McCann says. "I talked to him while we were making this record."I got stuck on lyrics a few times and I'd talk to him and he'd say, like, 'Don't sweat it, it'll come to you.' He just put my mind at ease and it worked out."

To reciprocate, McCann, Nassau's singer, guitarist and principal songwriter, dedicated a song to Pollard, the up-tempo "Captain."

"He is the captain, after all," McCann explains. "It's just about his work ethic and how inspirational he is to me."

It was during his time as a drummer for GBV, Tangiers and The American Flag that McCann was inspired to form his own band. Nassau's 2005 psych-rock debut, A Fire In The Ashes, was composed solely by McCann and contained material from a broad span of time.

The rest of the band — his brother Chris McCann, Brad Pallister and Al Kelso — brought more to Nassau's second album, Machines To Paradise, which is scheduled for an Oct. 24 release through Outside. McCann says their input accounts for the big difference between records.

"As a band, I think we're probably not going to make the same record twice. We're not going to change drastically from record to record, but we like variety and we like making different kinds of music. Expect the unexpected from us, I guess."

Though maintaining some of the dark and meandering rock that filled much of their debut, the Toronto-based Nassau have diversified to include more pop, classic rock and, on "Desiree," a gentle strummer that could well be an homage to Neil Young, one of the band's greatest influences.Perhaps because the album is so varied, McCann says he doesn't imagine his band fitting in very easily with Toronto's thriving indie rock scene.

"We just don't really fit in with anything that I'm aware of, anyway. It's ultimately just pop music, but it's got a lot of different aspects. So I don't really know where we fit in, and I'm not too concerned about finding where we fit in. I just want to do what we do, and hopefully appeal to an audience, so that we can keep doing this. It's getting more and more fun, and I'm having a lot more fun doing it now than ever."

Nassau has two Toronto shows scheduled this month, on Oct. 17 at Lee's Palace and on Oct. 26 at The Boat.