Pitchfork

"It's funny, I keep trying to get away from the birds but they keep coming back to me," Shearwater's Jonathan Meiburg, a "semi-retired" ornithologist, admits. And indeed, birds abound in Shearwater's oeuvre, from the band's moniker to song titles like "Sing, Little Birdie" to album names like Winged Life and the latest, Rook.

Rook will alight on record shelves June 3 thanks to Matador. It's the Austin quartet's fifth full-length overall and first all-new release for the indie giant, although Matador did reissue an expanded edition of Shearwater's 2006 set, Palo Santo (originally released on Misra), in spring 2007.

"Rooks are very interesting birds," Meiburg muses. "They're very clever, very social, and when you see a group of them by the side of the road in Europe they always look like they're planning something [laughs]. They always look like you just interrupted a meeting."

Yet Rook isn't just for the birds. Meiburg chose the title for its sound ("it's got the nice 'k' at the end of it") and its multiple meanings, from the card game to the verb form of the word: "To rook also means to steal something, and-- maybe not so much as magpies-- but rooks will often take little items out of your garden, or shiny things. They have a reputation for mischief."

Theft of another, more dire sort plays into Rook's 10 tracks. "There's this theme of environmental destruction that runs through the record and of worlds being lost," Meiburg recounts. "Not purely literally but also metaphorically."

Environmental degradation makes for uncertain times, and this idea also manifests itself sonically on Rook. "I really wanted you to not know where the songs are going; some of them stop very abruptly, others go on and on. As you listen to it I just wanted you to have no real sense of security about what the next song was going to do."

Meiburg also invites us to consider Rook in naturalistic terms. "The record, I keep thinking of it this way: I thought of Palo Santo as a series of islands, like this weird archipelago leaning over the sea, and then [Rook] begins on the open sea and dives to explore sunken continents.

"Just to get ridiculously pretentious about it," he adds with a laugh.




On these so-called "sunken continents", listeners will find a wealth of new instrumentation. "We were able to make much more elaborate arrangements than we were able to previously," Meiburg enthuses. "Although I'm very suspicious of everything playing all the time. But I think it's sort of a richer and deeper record, and in some ways less desperate-sounding than Palo Santo. And we have the strings and the harpist and the woodwinds; we were able to create more with that in ways that we haven't before."

Meiburg hopes to gather all the musical forces behind Rook for a gala show in NYC in early May. After that, the core Shearwater crew will hit the road with Clinic-- although minus longtime multi-instrumentalist Howard Draper.

"Howard is not playing in the band anymore," Meiburg reveals. "Howard took a hard look at how much touring we were going to have to do for the record and he's got other things going on in his life that he really enjoys. I don't blame anybody who goes, 'I like my life and I don't want to throw it overboard to ride around in a van for four months or five months of the year' [laughs]. But he played on the record and he's great."

Kevin Schneider will assume Draper's roles on "the next couple of tours with us," says Meiburg. "We're going to see how things go from there."

Apart from the whole garnering exposure and making a living thing, touring also affords Meiburg ample opportunities to frolic with his beloved birds. "I do have my binoculars with me at all times," he admits.

A recent jaunt with Bill Callahan resulted in a few memorable moments. "Bill accused me of having a birder's form of Tourettes or something because I really have to try to squash the impulse to yell out whatever type of bird it is that I've suddenly seen. One time in Florida I nearly whacked him in the face! I was like, 'Look! Look! There's a white ibis!'"

Despite these threats to Bill Callahan's livelihood, Meiburg actually did double duty on the tour, both opening for Callahan and playing in his band along with Shearwater percussionist Thor Harris. "I got to play electric guitar in somebody's band for the first time since I was like 16. It was awesome."

And despite Shearwater's recent ascent, Meiburg continues to play in Okkervil River, though his touring role has been understandably reduced. "They and I agree that I'd be an idiot if I passed up a bunch of Shearwater stuff to do more Okkervil touring with them."

But Meiburg will keep contributing to Okkervil records. Indeed, "I was just working on one of them last week." The Shearwater frontman won't disclose much more than that, however. As he says with a laugh, "You're going to have to go to them for that."

As for the birding, Meiburg's next endeavor is to perfect his bird call identification skills.

"This group of blue jays was just cracking me up because they make so many different kinds of sounds, and they imitate other kinds of birds sometimes. They love to imitate red-shouldered hawks. I'll think I hear this red-shouldered hawk and I'll try to look around for the hawk but it's just a blue jay in a tree."

He continues, "But they're just always steaming. It seems like every sound they make sounds annoyed or dissatisfied. They just don't seem like they're happy with their lot-- they always want to fiddle with things."

Adds Meiburg with a chuckle, "Might make a good record producer, a blue jay!"

Rook:

01 On the Death of the Waters
02 Rooks
03 Leviathan, Bound
04 Home Life
05 Lost Boys
06 Century Eyes
07 I Was a Cloud
08 South Col
09 The Snow Leopard
10 The Hunter's Star

Migration:

05-09 Boston, MA - Paradise *
05-10 Montreal, Quebec - La Sala Rosa *
05-11 Toronto, Ontario - Lee's Palace *
05-12 Chicago, IL - Empty Bottle *
05-13 Minneapolis, MN - 7th St Entry
05-16 Seattle, WA - Neumos *
05-17 Vancouver, British Columbia - Richard's on Richards *
05-18 Portland, OR - Doug Fir Lounge *
05-19 San Francisco, CA - Independent *
05-20 West Hollywood, CA - The Troubadour *

* with Clinic