Release Date: April 2, 2013
Just four years after one-time indie rock band Rilo Kiley signed to a major record label—a move that garnered the group comparisons to Fleetwood Mac—the female-led quartet called it quits. As lead guitarist and vocalist Blake Sennett would tell at least one music publication, the 2011 split was due to “deception, disloyalty, and grief,” but fans of Sennett and red-headed frontwoman Jenny Lewis could break it down into simpler terms: The band, formed in 1998 as Lewis “retired” from a once-successful child-acting career, wasn’t made to last.
Sennett, himself a former child actor (look up old episodes of Salute Your Shorts and Boy Meets World) blames ego, which is a likely enough cause. Truth be told, Sennett and Lewis, who had a brief romantic involvement in Rilo Kiley’s early days, moved on years ago, even before Warner Bros. Records released its fourth album, Under the Blacklight, in 2007.
Despite modest commercial success and strong reviews, Under the Blacklight marked the final full-length album for Rilo Kiley, while members worked on side projects like Sennett’s The Elected and Lewis’ solo career (she sang a duet with The Killers’ Brandon Flowers on his solo debut album in 2010) and the duo Jenny and Johnny, with Lewis’ boyfriend Johnathan Rice. But when band members choose to part ways, it doesn’t necessarily mark the end, as fans found with this spring’s release of Rkives, a collection of previously unreleased songs and B-sides.
Rilo Kiley went back to its independent-label roots, releasing Rkives through bassist Pierre de Reeder‘s label Little Record Company.
Don’t go looking for a cohesive sound or even one recurring theme in the 17 songs, one of which is a hidden track. After all, that isn’t necessarily the point of a rarities release. Instead, long-time Rilo Kiley fans can set aside the liner notes and make a little guessing game out of which songs came out of which phase of the band’s 13-year career.
And for those new to the group, the at-times awkward disjointedness of Rkives is kind of fun.
The album’s lead single and opening track, “Let Me Back In,” is Lewis’s testament to her undying love for Los Angeles, how the city always greets her with open arms despite life’s failings and failed relationships. The track starts Rkives off on a strong note with its offerings of alternative country-infused sound: “And when the ṗalm trees bow their heads/No matter how cruel I’ve been/LA, you always let me back in.”
The slower tempoed “Draggin’ Around” shares several lyrics verbatim from the bouncy, cowbell-driven, disco-era “Breakin’ Up” from Under the Blacklight. Both are must-haves when a relationship hits the wall, as Lewis sings of her ex-lover meeting new (and prettier) girls. Feel free to snap those fingers along to “The Frug,” the story of a girl who can do practically anything, including the ‘60s dance craze for which the track is named, but fall in love.
Perhaps Rkives is a lesson for loyal followers and band members alike: Stick with what you know and know that signing with a major label isn’t always the best route. The album is far from perfect, but the best of fans will appreciate the rarities’ elements, quirks and all, allowing the group to live again. Rilo Kiley’s members say they’ve moved on, but Rikives is evidence that they, too, still care.
Rilo Kiley – Rkives tracklist:
- “Let Me Back In”
- “I’ll Get You There”
- “Runnin’ Around”
- “All the Drugs”
- “Bury, Bury, Bury Another”
- “Well, You Left”
- “Draggin’ Around”
- “I Remember You”
- “Dejalo (Zondo remix w/Too $hort)”
- “A Town Called Luckey”
- “Emotional”
- “American Wife”
- “Patiently”
- “Rest of My Life (demo)”
- “About the Moon”
- “The Frug”
- “Untitled”
