I miss The Postal Service. Not the people delivering the mail. I mean the one-time music partnership of Ben Gibbard (Death Cab) and Jimmy Tamborello (Dntel) that released the album, Give Up, in 2003 and never made another record.
Story goes that Tamborello and Gibbard sent each other ideas for this record through the snail mail, hence the name. Tamborello writes the music on Give Up, which skirts electronic nostalgia with its glitchy bleeps of 8-bit video games and distorted beats that usher it into the laptop era. Gibbard writes the poppy vocal melodies and lyrics that wear their anxiety, loneliness, and desire for love on every fiber of their sleeve.
I first heard Give Up after graduating from college and it felt like my personal soundtrack to those first years of 'real world' life. The music is so hopeful and upbeat but tempered by the disillusionment of the characters in the songs. They want to believe that they can be successful, that they can fall in love, that putting themselves out there is worth it, even when the world keeps closing its doors.
Postal Service isn't coming back. They aren't going to put out another album. And I guess I miss the potential in things.
I recently found two bands that are cousins to Postal Service -- Letting Up Despite Great Faults and Freelance Whales. Give them a try. They're not PS, but they do combine clicky, distorted electronic sounds with sharp, introspective lyrics.
Freelance Whales from SXSW 2010:
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