Destroyer gets piggy with it

We interrupt this Totally Wired dispatch to bring you a nearly 14-minute ambient disco track by Destroyer (a.k.a. Dan Bejar). Pace yourself, New Pornographers fans — this groove-tastic anthem is about the 1961 Cuban Bay of Pigs invasion. The ying to Your Blues’ yang, “Bay of Pigs” takes up the entire A-side of the new EP of the same name (due out Aug. 18 on Merge Records), while the B-side is devoted to a track called “Ravers” composed on a single analog synthesizer, making this, just maybe, the most ambitious Destroyer offering yet.

But like all Destroyer songs, we’re left with one question: what does it really mean? I set off to do some detective work of my own. Without further ado, I give you this second-by-second breakdown of “Bay of Pigs,” an epic musical journey akin to The Doors' “The End,” Led Zeppelin's “Stairway to Heaven” and Rush’s side-one 2112 suite.

But before I delve into Destroyer’s ambient disco masterpiece, I thought I’d take heed from what the PR folks say. Here’s Merge’s official statement on the subject:

It explores some of the more meditative realms of 20th Century classical composition. The song itself is a casual rumination on parties, political parties, madness and suffering (for one's art).

I hope I don’t suffer alongside it. Listen along to my commentary here.

00:00 - This song is 13 minutes and 38 seconds long — holy shit.

00:05 - I’m hearing some ethereal droning sounds, akin to the opening of David Lynch’s Dune. New direction?

1:00 - A minute in and still no Muppet vox. This sounds like the beginning of a yoga video. When will Destroyer connect me with my inner child? There was none of that on Streethawk: A Seduction.

1:13 - Spiraling keyboard sounds — yes! These make “Bay of Pigs” sound even more New Age-y than I ever thought possible. Did Destroyer read The Secret or something?

1:48 - Finally the vocals kick in and Dan Bejar’s telling me to “listen.” What do you think I’ve been doing for the last minute and a half?

1:53 - “I’ve been drinking.” Well, duh.

2:05 - Their house is in ruins and he doesn’t know what he’s doing. You and me both, my friend.

2:20 - He’s alone at the pier, watching ships disappear. Shit’s about to get metaphorical! Finally, some details about the actual Bay of Pigs?

2:50 - Nope, instead the vocals have dissolved into droning electronica. "Bay of Pigs" is the first Destroyer release that could be aptly compared to Radiohead’s Kid A. But maybe every Radiohead album after The Bends is “ambient disco” in its own way.

3:08 - Dan Bejar is either saying “the world is just born” or “the world is just spoons.” Neither of those seems appropriate.

3:10 - I stand corrected: “the world is just black stones in the rain with no place to go but home.” I knew he’d never run out of obtuse metaphors!

3:20 - Destroyer is apparently “pro-stars, pro-skies.” That seems like a perfectly logical position to take on celestial entities.

3:28 - Add to droning synths, some twinkly bells effects! And a description of “the discotheque at night.” Anyone gonna mention Bianca Jagger’s rack?

3:45 - Ooh, a repetitive coda of “it don’t mean a thing, it never means a thing, it’s got that swing”… I never thought I’d see the day when Bejar cops from Duke Ellington, but here it is.

4:15 - Dramatically plucked electronic guitar: you are to New Age synths what Mary Kate is to Ashley.

4:35 - What-The-Fuck-Lyrical-Genius-Moment Number One: "Magnolia's a girl, her heart's made of wood/ As apocalypses go, that's pretty good — sha la la — wouldn't you say?” Aptly followed by Kraftwerk-esque keyboard freakery, wouldn’t you know.

5:02 - Suddenly “Bay of Pigs” has transformed into Cher’s “Believe” and Destroyer is requesting us to remove both our spurs and antlers. I’m so doing it to this song.

5:08 - What-The-Fuck-Lyrical-Genius-Moment Number Two: “I haven’t seen you for ages, I still fly into rages/ A dimension of your name, Chrrriisstttttinnnne!” About the car or a trashy Vancouverite?

5:25 - We are now cooking with disco. There are whistle backing solos and an actual percussive beat and even though I still have little to no understanding of US trade relations, I have never felt more alive.

5:50 - You better watch it pulsating keyboards, or you are going to turn into a Gino Soccio track.

6:16 - Damn it, Destroyer! I was expecting this to get all Hercules and Love Affair, but it’s instead dissipating to yoga music again. This man knows how to tease and taunt a listener. It’s like trying to have sex with a guy who only wants to hold your hand and talk about his love of Morrissey.

6:50 - Destroyer lives in a mine and slings mud at towers all the time. Is this why he wouldn’t return Exclaim’s interview requests?

6:56 - “I took a walk and threw up in an English garden.” These things happen to the best of us. Still those Joy Division guitar strums make the whole pursuit sound pretty rock 'n’ roll. Throwing up is the new throwing up?

7:15 - Typical Destroyer “a da da” mumbling, but triple layered onto “le freak/ c’est chic” synths. This is better than when he was trying to imitate The Captain & Tennille.

7:35 - What-The-Fuck-Lyrical-Genius-Moment Number Three: "I was born in the North, but my father's from the South/ Love is a political beast with jaws for a mouth/ I don't care."

7:45 - I like it when Destroyer flies into uncontrollable rages because it seems more empathetic to me as a listener. Maybe it has something to do with my father… hmm…

7:55 - “You’re on the side of good/ I was inside of the sea’s guts.” But if you only listened to the guitar part, you’d swear you were watching the opening credits to Flight of the Concords.

8:05 - There is a crumbling beauty trapped in paradise and the tide comes in, comes out and goes away. THINGS YOU ALREADY KNEW THAT DESTROYER FEELS FREE TO OBLIQUELY TELL YOU ANYWAY.

8:18 - I am beginning to get the suspicion that Destroyer is making a lot of this shit up on the spot.

8:20 - Ooh, disco beats!

8:35 - Best moment yet of “Bay of Pigs”: a double-tracked Destroyer dueting to the line, “compliments go into my head — la di dah, la di dah!”

8:42 - What-The-Fuck-Lyrical-Genius-Moment Number Four: “Speaking of a world going sour on you/ I was 20 years old, in 1992.” Say no more, mon amour.

8:56 - Destroyer is a hopeless romantic and you are swine. Way to keep with the theme, dude. By the way, this is epic ambient disco — and I’d never heard of that genre until nine minutes ago.

9:05 - In a tinny falsetto akin to BabyFace: “You’ve got to stop calling me honey.” I wish I could call Destroyer honey.

9:15 - When Destroyer says “fuck,” it doesn’t sound the way regular people say it. It’s both pissy and hilarious — the way I imagine Bruce Vilanch swearing.

9:38 - We are, according to the song, right at the conclusion of the world’s immaterial secrets, and yet have four minutes to go. What more could Destroyer have to say?

9:43 - Most disco moment yet — Destroyer whispering “shut ya mouth!” as the bassline takes over. Sexy!

10:01 - There's a foot-stomping, booty-bouncing bass line as Bejar creeps, “I’ve seen it all.” You ain’t seen nothing yet.

10:40 - Next coda: “Free and easy/ Gentle, gentle/ The wind through the trees makes you mental for me.” If Taste of Honey had such sophisticated lyricism, maybe “Boogie Oogie Oogie” would’ve referenced at least the Franco-Prussian war.

11:05 - Still doing this “free and easy” thing. I guess it’s “Bay of Pigs” most discernable chorus but it would be an epic fail during a round of Wayne Brady’s Don’t Forget The Lyrics.

11:18 - Everything has gone strangely quiet. EYE WEEKLY readers, we have entered the “Bay Of Pigs” eye of the storm.

12:18 - Just heard over a minute of droning ambient electronic noise. I hate to compare it to Radiohead… but yeah, it’s Radiohead.

13:00 - Still soldiering on here folks with the ambient noise droning… I guess instead of going out with a bang, it’s whimpering weird-ass electronica?

13:07 - There’s those spiraling synths again! I was wondering where Bejar was keeping them, but maybe he just lost them in his hair.

13:12 - He's got 30 more seconds to make “Bay Of Pigs” make sense… can he do it?

13:22 - I guess the whispered choral vocals do make me understand John F. Kennedy’s decision to invade Cuba under tenuous trade relations…

13:25 - …and the fluttering keyboards totally mimic Fidel Castro’s approach to diplomacy.

13:38 - And we end it the way we began it, a man asking us to “listen” as the ambient music trails off. We did it!