Benjamin Gibbard (b. August 11, 1976, Bremerton, Washington) is an American musician known as a member of several successful indie rock bands. He is the lead singer of Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service, also known for his project ¡All-Time Quarterback! and his first band, Pinwheel. He is married to actress and musician Zooey Deschanel.
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Death Cab for Cutie is a Grammy-nominated American indie rock band, formed in Bellingham, Washington in 1997. The band consists of Benjamin Gibbard (vocals, guitar), Chris Walla (guitar, production), Nick Harmer (bass), and Jason McGerr (drums). Gibbard took the band name from the title of the song written by Neil Innes and Vivian Stanshall and performed by their group, the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, in The Beatles's 1967 film, Magical Mystery Tour.
Gibbard's first album, You Can Play These Songs with Chords, was released as a demo, leading to a record deal with Barsuk Records.
It was at this time that Gibbard decided to expand the project into a complete band, and recruited band members to join. The band has released six studio albums, five EPs, and one demo. Their most recent album, Narrow Stairs, was released on May 12, 2008 in the United Kingdom and the following day in the United States.
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Transatlanticism is the fourth studio album by Death Cab for Cutie, released October 7, 2003 on Barsuk Records. Prior to the album's release, Gibbard stated: "...unlike The Photo Album, I feel like this record is definitely more like a proper album. We’ve tried to construct it with transitions of songs going in and out of each other, and I think it’s a little bit more expansive than the last record."
The album peaked at number 97 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart, and is Jason McGerr's first as the band's drummer.
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Title and Registration
was the third single taken from Death Cab for Cutie's Transatlanticism. It was officially released as an internet-only single that could be streamed through the band's website.
Live, the song's layered instrumentation has been difficult to pull off and thus has been performed a variety of ways. All of these involve Chris Walla switching halfway through the song from lead guitar to keyboards, while Ben Gibbard takes over the guitar part. For the first half of the song, initially, both Gibbard and drummer Jason McGerr used electronic drums in order to replicate the distinctive drum machine sound in the song.
In the band's 2008 tour, Gibbard performed the entire first two verses as lead vocalist, without a guitar or drums; before picking up his guitar as Walla abandoned his.
Most recently, Gibbard has kept his electric guitar strapped on for the songs entirety, but has used a shaker as percussion during the song's first two verses.
The video, directed by Patrick Daughters, consists of frontman Ben Gibbard lying on an operating table while undergoing a "surgery" (as done by the other band members) to receive a new heart. Although his head is on the table and he is singing, the surgery is done without anesthetics. During the surgery, it is shown that Gibbard's chest is simply paper, model organs, and a model rib cage.
[8977 Kanye West / 8976 Gibbard / 8972 Eminem]