When listening to Siberian, it’s possible you might think to
yourself for just a moment, “Have I heard this before?” The Seattle
band makes comfortable, familiar indie rock, with reverb-ed,
glacier-like guitars that fill up the vistas and valleys. Meanwhile,
Finn Parnell’s impressionistic lyrics are drawn out over long,
sustained vocal notes. It’s the Radiohead model, scaled down and
brought back to earth so that it’s played by mere mortals again; in
fact, it sounds like it’s being played by your good friends, a bunch of
guys who are cool and nice, so much so that you might even let
one of them date your little sister.
It’s this combination of dramatic grandeur and friendly
accessibility that makes Siberian’s music so effective. Says Parnell,
“The band really just came together as a mishmash of friends who all
happen to play music. We never really took it very seriously until a
demo we recorded ended up getting radio play.” The attention was
deserved, and things continued to go their way: Their album, With
Me, came out on Sonic Boom last year, and they’ve landed a coveted
slot at this year’s Sasquatch! Music Festival in May.
But for all its radio-friendly sheen, there’s a darker undercurrent
to With Me, hinting at sinister edges uncovered by digging
through one’s past. Characters are tied down to beds and floors; water
fills rooms and flows through people. Even the album cover is both
beautiful and creepy, as Parnell points out. “Andy Kehoe’s painting
reminded me of an old Twilight Zone episode about a folk singer
that goes out into the backwoods country to find inspiration, and meets
a pretty girl who sings this beautiful eerie song that foretells his
death.”
Live, however, the group’s camaraderie comes to the forefront, and
they’re downright goofy on stage. They can be comfortable and relaxed
since the music speaks for itself. “We try not to take ourselves
seriously. Even though some of the songs are pretty dramatic, we’re
really lighthearted people,” Parnell says. “Though, at times it’s a
little awkward to go into a serious song after cracking up.”