[review 2008: half-measures and quiet victories]

Even without knowing what happened to the Dears after Gang of Losers, it wasn’t hard to figure out what Missiles was going to sound like just from your gut feeling. It would be hard to recreate the luminescence of Gang of Losers without sounding like a thinly veiled retread, so the obvious next step was to take things down a notch. The indistinct cover album and the less grandiose title for Missiles were also clues. Then add in the fact that the band practically imploded, leaving only Murray Lightburn and Natalia Yanchak as the only members left standing, and it’s not at all surprising to find Missiles a scaled back, quieter affair.

In fact, Missiles is almost completely bereft of the epic musical statements that anchored Gang of Losers. The Dears have never been quite as popular as some of their independent Canadian comrades, partially because their uber-dramatic approach can be difficult to take—see the criticisms often levelled against some of the more bombastic tracks on No Cities Left. That’s not so much a problem now, as the Dears run quite a bit cooler emotionally and dynamically, which is great unless you think of the album as perpetually stuck in second gear, as the more ardent heart-on-sleeve supporters of the Dears might find. Missiles, then, has the ability to bring some of the naysayers into the fold, but also leave long-time fans wanting a bit more.