The Besnard Lakes return with their melodic yet mountainous sound world

On their new album The Besnard Lakes are the Ghost Nation, Montreal’s The Besnard Lakes return with their same melodic yet mountainous sound world; the keening, lilting vocals of Jace Lasek and Olga Goreas foregrounded, but this time around, there is a lightness and optimism at play. Perhaps a somewhat disingenuous sense of hope, in a world where it is currently often in short supply.

‘I feel like it’s a very formidable title, symbolic of the times,’ says Jace. ‘It’s talking about the death of nations, the threat of Canada being the 51st state. There is the desire to be left alone, to let community be community, all of those things that feel like they might be under siege; that’s what the ghost nation is.’

Lyrically, it considers the history of human progress: ‘It’s always been something in my mind; are we evolving, or are we devolving as a society? As m