Review: “Grand Eternal Season” by Bryan Dubay

In February, my band went on a mini tour of Pennsylvania and New York, and the third and final date of our tour brought us to the City of Buffalo on an unseasonably warm day at a little hidden gem of a place called Milkie’s.

There was a mirrored bar along one wall and a couple of tables and chairs scattered here and there throughout the room ready for us to rearrange. Mics, drum equipment and cables were all shoved in a corner like a discombobulated snake that needed unwinding. Bryan Dubay, who was there to open for us, introduced himself and offered to unwind the cables. He was a man of few words and even less equipment: just a guitar, an amp, and a sampler he would use on one or two songs. 

When his set began, I was immediately drawn in by his hushed vocals, confessional lyrics, and guitar work, which was reminiscent of Isaac Brock from Modest Mouse. As I collected money at the door, I was transported for an hour or so into the little indie corner of Bryan’s world. Whether it was the fatigue of traveling or the tenor of the music that brought me back to my college day listening to Death Cab for Cutie and Joan of Arc, Bryan’s performance was an ecstatic experience for me. I didn’t get a chance to tell him how the show made me feel because I couldn’t think of the words at the time, but I was excited to hear more. 

What I wasn’t expecting when I listened to his recorded stuff was what an expansive and rich soundscape he would use to fill out those simple indie songs I heard at Milkie’s: a bouncing, rolling bass; electronic waves; bells and subtle distortion; guitar work that noodled in all the right places; and intricate drum beats that made his record reminiscent of some of the best indie bands out there today. My band recently heard a couple of the songs he had posted and listened to them a number of times on our drive home to Baltimore. So when I found out he was releasing a whole album of songs called “Grand Eternal Season,” I was stoked to give it a listen.

With headphones on, I entered the world of Bryan Dubay once again. What struck me most (besides how FULL these songs were) was what a voice Bryan has! I found it to be similar to one of my favorite vocalists of all time, Jack Steadman from Bombay Bicycle Club. I wanted to go deeper, so I emailed Bryan for lyrics to the songs, which he willingly shared.

Among other things, “Grand Eternal Season” is a breakup album. The first song, “Driving North,” starts with the line “Maybe I could have been stronger, maybe you could have let up on me, Romantic dinner i.e. smashed plates. It was too late but I drove away.” The song ends with him driving away drunk and “happy/sad,” and the rest of the album follows with similar dichotomies: heaven and hell, feeling and not feeling, being “doomed and living,” murder and love, simplicity and complexity. An image that appears more than once on the album is the drip of sweat down his spine, a powerful distillation of the existential struggle Bryan was going through as he crafted his album.

Despite being a breakup album, there are only a few songs specifically about his ex (as far as I can tell). This includes the first song, “Driving North,” and the second to last song, “Good, Bye,” where he’s glad he decided to leave his ex but wishes he could have said goodbye. As I listened to the last song, “Bewind,” and heard the line “What if we all just slipped away, into our own universe, of our own making. Wouldn’t have to fake it,” I realized this might be a breakup album in another, more figurative sense of the word: a breakup with the old self.

As a writer myself, I know there is a catharsis to writing out what you feel. As a listener, I can sense this catharsis when Bryan sings about creativity in the song “B and C” with the line “I surround myself with pleasure and pain, I create my existence with silly little games.” In the last song, he echoes this sentiment with the line “Forgive me a bit of seriousness” (and believe me when I say that the album is full of seriousness).

But again, it is the dichotomy of seriousness and play that makes this album the banger that it is. Maybe this “Grand Eternal Season” is a chance to live with ALL of it: feel ALL the feelings, put in ALL of the instruments. Experience dark and light, not as opposites but as composites to the whole. Maybe Bryan realizes with all the work he’s done that he doesn’t need another person to complete him anymore. He has realized he’s complete in and of himself; he just had to unwind the cords.