Give Up (Digital Download Card)

The Postal Service: Ben Gibbard (guitar, electric piano, keyboards, drums); Jimmy Tamborello (programming). Additional personnel: Jen Wood (vocals); Chris Walls (piano); Jenny Lewis (background vocals). A side project from Death Cab For Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard and Jimmy Tamborello, who formerly played with synth-poppers Figurine but now records as Dntel, the Postal Service creates bedroom electronica with surprising emotional pull on GIVE UP. Ten tracks lyrically convey both a youthful ennui and the nostalgic ache of longing. Tamborello creates a tense sonic space that allows Gibbard's spare yet careful guitar to occasionally chime in and cut the tension. While Tamborello's sculpted electronics hearken back to the minimalism of early Depeche Mode, Gibbard's expressively fey vocals and emotional sentiments lend a warm, comforting contrast to the machine-age chilliness (as do the occasional backing vocals from Jen Wood and Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis). This contrast is best illustrated on "We Will Become Silhouettes," when Gibbard sings "[A]nd we become silhouettes when our bodies finally go," only to be followed by a string of optimistic bleeps that are the sonic equivalent of a miniature sky full of twinkling stars.