Death Cab for Cutie 'Plans' for success

If the first half of 2005 is any indication, Death Cab for Cutie is on the crest of becoming the coolest and most recognizable indie rock band on the planet. Seth Cohen of Fox's "The O.C." dubs the foursome his favorite band. DCFC played the show this spring, plexifilm recently \n released a DVD documenting their 2004 spring tour and the four boys from Bellingham, Wash., currently grace the covers of Spin, Paste and Under the Radar. But it is their decision to ditch their long-time partnership with indie label Barsuk earlier this year and record their fifth album Plans on major label Atlantic that will perhaps bring them the most attention in the long run.\nDeath Cab cut Plans from much the same wood as 2003's critically-acclaimed Transatlantacism, with its sharply-produced layered sound and nifty looped beats (both discs are produced by DCFC's guitarist Chris Walla). Plans comes off as a less cohesive effort than its 2003 predecessor and although it features many hits, they don't quite strike the same emotional chord as those on Transatlanticism. \nDeath Cab's horn-rimmed glasses and cardigan-wearing frontman Ben Gibbard (perhaps best known for lending his somber voice to his electronic-pop side project the Postal Service) employs smart, descriptive lyrics ranging in topic from the frustration of being abroad in "Different Names for the Same Thing" to the predictable songs about love lost in "Summer Skin" and "Someday You Will be Loved." But the theme most prominent on the album seems to be death, both coming to terms with the fact that someday someone you care about will die and seeing it first hand.\nDCFC's layered sound drops out halfway through the album on "I Will Follow You into the Dark," a Gibbard solo acoustic track in which he croons "love of mine/someday you will die/but I'll be close behind/I'll follow you into the dark." It's a wonderfully melodic tune fit for the end credits of a romantic drama to make the audience feel as if everything is going to be okay.\nIn "What Sarah Said," a piano ballad near the end of the disc, Gibbard cleverly describes the anxiety of watching a loved one near death in the hospital. "Each descending peak on the LCD took you a little further away from me/amongst the vending machines and year-old magazines/in a place where we only say goodbye," he sings. \nThe disc's first two tracks, "Marching Bands of Manhattan" and single "Soul Meets Body," flow in classic Death Cab fashion -- building up from the start until they crash into a repeated lyric at their finish. The upbeat "Crooked Teeth" bumbles around a sharp Nick Harmer bass line. \nSomewhere in Southern California, Seth Cohen is smiling.