Broken Social Scene founder on new album, legacy

Broken Social Scene: 8 p.m. Saturday; Jannus Live, 200 First Ave. N., St. Petersburg; $30.50 before fees; jannuslive.com

Several bands have put out reunion records in recent years, but few have gotten as much acclaim for their new albums as the previous ones.

Yet when Canadian indie-rock collective Broken Social Scene returned last year with “Hug of Thunder,” their first album in seven years, it received some of the best reviews of their career. Now their tour supporting the new record will bring them to Jannus Live in downtown St. Petersburg on Saturday.

Broken Social Scene was co-formed in 1999 by Brendan Canning, who's played in other bands including “Steal My Sunshine” group Len, and has featured Canadian musical luminaries including “1234” singer Leslie Feist and Metric’s Emily Haines. Their breakthrough was 2002’s “You Forgot It in People,” named one of the best albums of the 2000s by several publications including Pitchfork, which also praised “Hug of Thunder.”

In a phone interview from his home in Toronto, Canning discussed “Hug of Thunder,” “You Forgot It in People” and the soundtrack to Edgar Wright’s film “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” that features Canning’s original music. Here are excerpts.

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When you decided to release “Hug of Thunder,” Broken Social Scene’s first new album in seven years, what did you want to accomplish with it?

I mean, personally, just to carry on some kind of legacy and not come back with a flat offering for people who supported you early on. We all enjoyed playing the gigs and you want to come back and play some gigs with a body of work you can stand behind. It’s as simple as that, but not that simple to get to as far as making the record. But that’s generally the position. Was Broken Social Scene this band that was meaningful to us and meaningful to others? Well, yeah, sure it is, so let’s not embarrass ourselves.

What is the songwriting process for the band, which can have more than a dozen members at any given time?

Yeah, but really there’s a core band unless if Emily or Leslie are coming in guest vocals on one song, then the songwriting process adheres to them a little more with a stronger voice because they’re the ones spitting out the lead melody and the lyrics. But generally we have a core band. If I’m on guitar, I come up with my guitar parts. If there’s no vocals on a track and I have an idea, it’s like “Hey, we could try this.” It’s one of those best idea in the room wins.

What was it like working with Feist again on the title track, featuring the first lead vocals by her on a Broken Social Scene song in more than a decade?

That song in particular was definitely good for Leslie because she’s often felt that she kind of comes in and drops these top-lines on songs and that was the first chance for her to really see a song from the ground on up. She’s put in her time with this group, you know, and always been really generous with her time and her efforts and all that. It takes a certain amount of patience to be with this crew — that kind of goes without saying.

Besides the release of “Hug of Thunder,” last year also marked the 15-year anniversary of “You Forgot It in People,” which was this big influential album that Lorde even later referenced in her song “Ribs.” How do you feel about that legacy?

I think it’s a rather fortunate position to be in. When you get called for a festival but the stipulation is we want you to play “You Forgot It in People,” in some ways, you think, “That’s really generous, thanks a lot, guys,” but this small part of you is saying, “What about the new tunes?” But I can’t argue with the fact that OK, love this album, it happened a long time ago. It definitely is responsible for what we have today essentially, or at least that was the leap-off point. It’s a blessing that it got received the way it did and enabled us to go on playing places like Florida that are pretty far away from us, but we’re still speaking a similar language. Maybe some of our tribe is down there, some of our tribe is in Poland — probably less.

You contributed music for the soundtrack to “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.” How was it working on that movie?

You know what, it’s funny, we were just out with Edgar’s assistant the other day. I loved working on “Scott Pilgrim.” It was like, “We need music,” just showed me a picture of the drummer, it’s like this little kid giving the finger. I’m like, “You mean like, you want some D.R.I., Napalm Death kind of vibe.” They said, “Yes, exactly” and I’m like “Oh, no problem,” I know that stuff like the back of my hand. I don’t get to play that sort of card in Broken Social Scene. We had another one that was a little bit like a Beastie Boys punk tune from the ’90s as well. It was super fun doing that.

Is there anything else you’re working on, either with Broken Social Scene or solo?

We’ve still got some Broken Social Scene stuff coming down the pipe, there’s going to be new music. It wasn’t, OK, here’s the first album in six years and then whoa, that was tiring, we’re going to take another three years off. I think we all want to continue this and keep our head in the game, as it were. I enjoy playing the shows, I’ve done a bunch of solo touring over the years and that’s fun too, but it’s just as fun playing the big rooms. I like the material we have, I think the new record’s good and I could play that, or if people want to hear the oldies, I’m happy to play the oldies. It’s a fortunate position to be in and I think we all want to pay homage to that and be grateful. We’ve been a band for 18 years, but people still show up and buy tickets to the gigs, and that doesn’t happen for everyone.