Death Cab for Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard will release his solo debut album, Former Lives, on Oct. 16. The record will be released on local label Barsuk Records, which is the label that helped give Death Cab its start. According to a press release announcing the album, Gibbard wrote the 12 songs on Former Lives during an eight-year span and Gibbard put the finishing touches on the songs after moving from Seattle to Los Angeles.
Stereogum has an interview with Gibbard where he gives a little bit of insight into the album and his decision to release a solo record. He says the songs on Former Lives don’t represent outtakes from Death Cab recording sessions, rather they are songs that didn’t quite fit into the band’s sound and he compares some of the record to Big Star and Teenage Fanclub. He also makes mention that there’s a mariachi band on the album, so expect Former Lives to showcase a different side of Gibbard.
Here’s what Gibbard had to say about going solo:
It wasn’t a goal and it certainly wasn’t a reaction to any sort of dissatisfaction to recording with Death Cab or anything like that. It certainly doesn’t come out of like “I have all these songs to record and I’m not getting my fix with the band.” It was never anything like that and I never really had this idea that “Oh someday I’ll make a solo record,” and that I’ll go solo, which is definitely not what this is.”
