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Shapes and Sizes burn their candle at both ends

IN GOOD FORM: Shapes and Sizes

Three years ago, Shapes and Sizes arrived in Montreal from their native British Columbia with two albums under their belts and the indie rock dream in their hearts. The move worked out, as the quartet have nicely settled into their adopted city like so many square pegs who have somehow found their place in Montreal’s many round holes. The fruit of their three-year acclimation period is Candle to Your Eyes, a sparse third album reflecting the gradual progression that came after their big move.

“The way we wrote songs didn’t shift so much,” says vocalist/guitarist Caila Thompson-Hannant. “Mostly what changed was our attitudes and our perspectives. Everything else about us, really.”

It was impossible to keep real life separate from their musical ones. Unintentionally, Candle to Your Eyes turned out darker than the band had originally planned and took more time to finish. As the four members forged individual paths—bassist Nathan Gage opened the record store Phonopolis, vocalist/guitarist Rory Seydel got married and scored a gig with comic book publisher Drawn & Quarterly, drummer Jonathan Crellin attended school and Thompson-Hannant pulled double duty with Think About Life—Shapes and Sizes seemed to somewhat recede into the background, even if they never officially went on hiatus.

“I think we needed [a break] and it probably happened for a reason,” says Thompson-Hannant. When the time came to begin recording Candle to Your Eyes in February, 2009, the band had already written and performed much of the new, more contemplative and melodic material.

“Originally, we had intended to record the album in one week at Hotel2Tango. We wanted to keep things smaller. With [2007’s] Split Lips, Winning Hips, a Shiner, we did a lot of the extra arranging in the studio, and with Candle, we didn’t allow for as much experimentation.”

Despite finishing the initial mixes within the allotted week, they eventually went to the Pines to finish the album with Dave Bryant. “The songs we did at Hotel2Tango were actually sounding a lot different,” Thompson-Hannant notes. “A lot of the drafty, atmospheric stuff was Dave’s imprint from working with us.”

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