For 25 years and across 10 LPs, Death Cab for Cutie have given tender-hearted listeners sweeping indie rock songs to soundtrack feelings of lust, love, loss and everywhere in between. The band born out of Bellingham, WA, have been through a lot: they were a cornerstone of '00s indie rock, seen members come and go, released a few middling albums, and made some modern classics. Through their ups and the downs, Death Cab for Cutie have left an indelible mark on generations of loyal listeners who, like The O.C.'s Seth Cohen, will passionately say, "Do not insult Death Cab!"
In honour of the 20th anniversary of the band's beloved album Transatlanticism (which came out October 7, 2003), and as the band hit the road on a joint with frontman Ben Gibbard's side-project the Postal Service, here are Death Cab for Cutie's 20 best songs.
20. "Foxglove Through the Clearcut"
Asphalt Meadows (2022)
The epic centrepiece of Death Cab's latest album is their greatest song in the past decade. Ben Gibbard's pensive, narrative spoken word mulls over existence and purpose in a way that shows us a man, 25 years into his career, renewed, refreshed and cosmically curious under twinkling post-rock expansiveness.
Chris Gee
19. "A Lack of Color"
Transatlanticism (2003)
As the closing track of the band's most beloved album, "A Lack of Color" is one of Transatlanticism's more muted-sounding songs. It's a surprising choice to not end an album full of grand moments on a bombastic note, but on this acoustic number, with Gibbard's poignant and detailed lyrics on lost love taking the spotlight. While DCFC have included barebones acoustic songs on other albums, they all pale in comparison to "A Lack of Color."
Laura Stanley
18. "The New Year"
Transatlanticism (2003)
There's nothing more familiar and comforting than hearing the two opening chords of "The New Year," the first track on Transatlanticism. As its sweeping progression rushes skyward, it also signals Death Cab for Cutie's ascension into becoming a household name. The repeated lyric, "There'd be no distance that could hold us back," is the revelatory statement that would eventually carry the album to be hailed as a modern classic.
Chris Gee
17. "My Mirror Speaks"
The Open Door EP (2009)
With songs that didn't make it onto Narrow Stairs, plus a demo version of a track that did, The Open Door EP features some of the band's more buoyant rock tracks. EP highlight "My Mirror Speaks" swings with an energetic melody, a tight guitar riff, and some crunchy percussion from Jason McGerr that evokes the sound of smashing glass. As Gibbard sings of a man wrestling with aging and his regrets, his frustration is striking and relatable.
Laura Stanley
16. "Photobooth"
The Forbidden Love EP (2000)
Released in between We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes and The Photo Album, "Photobooth" is the perfect bridge between the band's early lo-fi alt-rock sound and the catchy, poppier melodies heard since. Anchored by a preset beat from a toy keyboard, "Photobooth" vividly captures the bitter aftertaste of a summer romance. It's the band's best song to not appear on an LP.
Laura Stanley
15. "You Are a Tourist"
Codes and Keys (2011)
One song from the oft-forgotten Codes and Keys has become an energizing staple during the band's live sets. The huge, arena-ready guitar riff that runs throughout "You Are a Tourist" is an indirect nod to U2's the Edge (in a good way) — and hey, the melancholy indie-rockers are allowed to have some feel-good, life-affirming fun sometimes, too.
Chris Gee
14. "I Will Possess Your Heart"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
The bold, nearly nine-minute song (which warranted the band's first and only radio edit) slowly builds around Nick Harmer's hypnotic bassline, toe-tapping drums, and plinking pianos slithering towards Gibbard's intense, creepy fictional telling about unrequited love. It taps into the group's more boisterous side. It was something of a curveball at the time, but it now feels like essential Death Cab for Cutie.
Chris Gee
13. "Champagne from a Paper Cup"
Something About Airplanes (1998)
When Death Cab released their debut album Something About Airplanes in 1998, Pacific Northwest college indie rock was in its golden era. From the tongue-in-cheek sense of humour to the reedy, malleable textures, "Champagne from a Paper Cup" features some of Gibbard's most plainspoken, emotionally distraught lyrics — some foreshadowing into followed in the next three decades.
Chris Gee
12. "Crooked Teeth"
Plans (2005)
On Plans, Death Cab for Cutie made the jump from Seattle-based indie label Barsuk to major label Atlantic, and with it came their biggest radio pop hits. The polished "Crooked Teeth" features frisky guitar and bass interplay, riffs seamlessly flowing into each other as Gibbard's witty chorus orbits slightly above. Along with the other singles on the album, "Crooked Teeth" skyrocketed in popularity, paving the way for a new wave of indie, emo-adjacent bands by breaking into the mainstream.
Chris Gee
11. "We Laugh Indoors"
The Photo Album (2001)
"We Laugh Indoors" is one of the more raw, grittier cuts in Death Cab for Cutie's repertoire, and one where guitarist Chris Walla really blossoms as the band's producer. The pummeling drums and off-kilter, spindly guitar riff gives way to controlled, chaotic distortion and a rare unhinged Gibbard vocal delivery. "We Laugh Indoors" was an ambitious, dynamic addition to the group's ever-expanding sound.
Chris Gee
10. "Styrofoam Plates"
The Photo Album (2001)
There are a lot of venomous DCFC songs, but "Styrofoam Plates" is them at their angriest. Gibbard holds absolutely nothing back as he eviscerates a deadbeat dad at his funeral: "You're a disgrace to the concept of family," he sings. While this chorus-less song is not the catchiest track in the band's catalogue, its biting lyrics makes it one of the most memorable.
Laura Stanley
9. "Bixby Canyon Bridge"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
Gibbard wrote much of Narrow Stairs during a two-week songwriting retreat at a cabin in Big Sur where Jack Kerouac once stayed — and the spirit of Kerouac haunts the album's expansive opener, "Bixby Canyon Bridge." But even if you're not the type of person who keeps a worn out copy of On the Road on hand (and you actively avoid people who do), there's something intoxicating about the dazzling vistas the band conjure on this song. Starting with ghostly guitar tones, the song steadily descends into chaos as the band unleash a weird and wild wall of din. This is just the beginning of the twists and turns of Narrow Stairs.
Laura Stanley
8. "Title Track"
We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes (2000)
The cheekily titled "Title Track" places listeners in the middle of a late-'90s college party where the air is thick with a heady combination of beer, cigarettes and lust. This cut from the band's under-appreciated second record, We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes, is anchored by a lulling but sharp drum beat that hypnotizes listeners just like the song's subject does to Gibbard. Rippling with sexual tension, "Title Track" shows us that sometimes the most subtle-sounding Death Cab songs are their best.
Laura Stanley
7. "Brothers in a Hotel Bed"
Plans (2005)
On Plans' penultimate song, Gibbard's tragic imagery about mourning a lifetime of regret is heart-shattering, to say the least. The slow, haunting keys and pitter-pattering percussion adds to the many layers of cinematic devastation, gently guiding an overwhelming feeling of emptiness toward some level of acceptance. It's incredibly moving and gorgeously delicate, and it's very much Death Cab at their emotional peak.
Chris Gee
6. "A Movie Script Ending"
The Photo Album (2001)
When Death Cab for Cutie were name-checked on The O.C., the band's trajectory altered completely. "A Movie Script Ending" was the first of three songs to be heard over the show's four seasons, when it played on the car stereo, prompting a grump Summer Roberts to describe it as "one guitar and a whole lot of complaining." Admittedly a hilarious summary of a lot of early-aughts rock, the flickering "A Movie Script Ending" is steeped in nostalgia rather than complaints. Like many early Death Cab songs, its vague lyrics offer listeners only glimpses of the plot (a trip back home, twisted bedsheets and headlights on the highway) but it's more than enough to get a sense of a band destined for stardom.
Laura Stanley
5. "What Sarah Said"
Plans (2005)
"What Sarah Said" unfolds like an episode of a medical drama. Tragedy has struck and, as Sarah lies dying, the narrator clings to hope that she will pull through. A pacing piano melody wanders the floor of an ICU waiting room that Gibbard vividly describes right down to its smell: "piss and 409." As the song steadily builds, so too does the optimism, but then Gibbard delivers a weeper of a line: "Love is watching someone die / So who's gonna watch you die?" This isn't the only time Death Cab confronted death on Plans, but, thanks to its evocative imagery, "What Sarah Said" feels genuinely affecting and never melodramatic.
Laura Stanley
4. "Cath…"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
From the ornate, evergreen guitar riff to Gibbard's matter-of-fact lyrics about mistaken love, "Cath…" took the blueprint from the early Death Cab for Cutie days and modernized it for the huge new wave of fans that followed Plans. "Cath…" bursts with luscious energy, cascading with "what-ifs" and sympathetic flourishes — one of the major highlights not only on Narrow Stairs but of the band's entire career.
Chris Gee
3. "Company Calls" / "Company Calls Epilogue"
We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes (2000)
The two-parter masterpiece on Death Cab's second album visits one of Gibbard's favourite settings: a wedding, where he questions love and falling into or out of it within the context of its ultimate celebration. The wiry guitars and stifled lyrics threatening to ruin the joyful event are splayed in cynical fashion during the hectic first act. "Epilogue" employs a more lethargic tone as the drunken bitterness turns into an apathetic, slowcore bent, flipping the phrase "synapse to synapse" onto its head as a way of disconnecting and falling into self-pity.
Chris Gee
2. "Title and Registration"
Transatlanticism (2003)
"The glove compartment is inaccurately named and everybody knows it" might be the most banal yet most memorable opening line in the '00s indie rock universe. What begins as a silly little comment quickly turns into Gibbard grappling with a breakup and using these mundane moments as a distraction from the loneliness. Throughout "Title and Registration," the crystal clear acoustic guitar, combined with a bitcrushed electronic beat (à la the Postal Service), is instantly recognizable, propelling this quintessential Death Cab track.
Chris Gee
1. "Transatlanticism"
Transatlanticism (2003)
"Transatlanticism" is where all of the best parts of Death Cab for Cutie come together. Across nearly eight minutes, Ben Gibbard, alone at the piano at first, unravels a passionate plea to be reunited with his love while Nick Harmer, Chris Walla and Jason McGerr patiently get louder in pitch-perfect harmony with the song's fervency. Gibbard's tender lyrics are wrapped around the monumental sounding instrumentation that the band — then and now — conjure so effortlessly. Often the final song in Death Cab's live show, "Transatlanticism" gives the audience permission to howl their own pain into the night. The ache in this song is so palpable that, 20 years later, "Transatlanticism" is still goosebump-inducing. So, come on.
Laura Stanley
In honour of the 20th anniversary of the band's beloved album Transatlanticism (which came out October 7, 2003), and as the band hit the road on a joint with frontman Ben Gibbard's side-project the Postal Service, here are Death Cab for Cutie's 20 best songs.
20. "Foxglove Through the Clearcut"
Asphalt Meadows (2022)
The epic centrepiece of Death Cab's latest album is their greatest song in the past decade. Ben Gibbard's pensive, narrative spoken word mulls over existence and purpose in a way that shows us a man, 25 years into his career, renewed, refreshed and cosmically curious under twinkling post-rock expansiveness.
Chris Gee
19. "A Lack of Color"
Transatlanticism (2003)
As the closing track of the band's most beloved album, "A Lack of Color" is one of Transatlanticism's more muted-sounding songs. It's a surprising choice to not end an album full of grand moments on a bombastic note, but on this acoustic number, with Gibbard's poignant and detailed lyrics on lost love taking the spotlight. While DCFC have included barebones acoustic songs on other albums, they all pale in comparison to "A Lack of Color."
Laura Stanley
18. "The New Year"
Transatlanticism (2003)
There's nothing more familiar and comforting than hearing the two opening chords of "The New Year," the first track on Transatlanticism. As its sweeping progression rushes skyward, it also signals Death Cab for Cutie's ascension into becoming a household name. The repeated lyric, "There'd be no distance that could hold us back," is the revelatory statement that would eventually carry the album to be hailed as a modern classic.
Chris Gee
17. "My Mirror Speaks"
The Open Door EP (2009)
With songs that didn't make it onto Narrow Stairs, plus a demo version of a track that did, The Open Door EP features some of the band's more buoyant rock tracks. EP highlight "My Mirror Speaks" swings with an energetic melody, a tight guitar riff, and some crunchy percussion from Jason McGerr that evokes the sound of smashing glass. As Gibbard sings of a man wrestling with aging and his regrets, his frustration is striking and relatable.
Laura Stanley
16. "Photobooth"
The Forbidden Love EP (2000)
Released in between We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes and The Photo Album, "Photobooth" is the perfect bridge between the band's early lo-fi alt-rock sound and the catchy, poppier melodies heard since. Anchored by a preset beat from a toy keyboard, "Photobooth" vividly captures the bitter aftertaste of a summer romance. It's the band's best song to not appear on an LP.
Laura Stanley
15. "You Are a Tourist"
Codes and Keys (2011)
One song from the oft-forgotten Codes and Keys has become an energizing staple during the band's live sets. The huge, arena-ready guitar riff that runs throughout "You Are a Tourist" is an indirect nod to U2's the Edge (in a good way) — and hey, the melancholy indie-rockers are allowed to have some feel-good, life-affirming fun sometimes, too.
Chris Gee
14. "I Will Possess Your Heart"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
The bold, nearly nine-minute song (which warranted the band's first and only radio edit) slowly builds around Nick Harmer's hypnotic bassline, toe-tapping drums, and plinking pianos slithering towards Gibbard's intense, creepy fictional telling about unrequited love. It taps into the group's more boisterous side. It was something of a curveball at the time, but it now feels like essential Death Cab for Cutie.
Chris Gee
13. "Champagne from a Paper Cup"
Something About Airplanes (1998)
When Death Cab released their debut album Something About Airplanes in 1998, Pacific Northwest college indie rock was in its golden era. From the tongue-in-cheek sense of humour to the reedy, malleable textures, "Champagne from a Paper Cup" features some of Gibbard's most plainspoken, emotionally distraught lyrics — some foreshadowing into followed in the next three decades.
Chris Gee
12. "Crooked Teeth"
Plans (2005)
On Plans, Death Cab for Cutie made the jump from Seattle-based indie label Barsuk to major label Atlantic, and with it came their biggest radio pop hits. The polished "Crooked Teeth" features frisky guitar and bass interplay, riffs seamlessly flowing into each other as Gibbard's witty chorus orbits slightly above. Along with the other singles on the album, "Crooked Teeth" skyrocketed in popularity, paving the way for a new wave of indie, emo-adjacent bands by breaking into the mainstream.
Chris Gee
11. "We Laugh Indoors"
The Photo Album (2001)
"We Laugh Indoors" is one of the more raw, grittier cuts in Death Cab for Cutie's repertoire, and one where guitarist Chris Walla really blossoms as the band's producer. The pummeling drums and off-kilter, spindly guitar riff gives way to controlled, chaotic distortion and a rare unhinged Gibbard vocal delivery. "We Laugh Indoors" was an ambitious, dynamic addition to the group's ever-expanding sound.
Chris Gee
10. "Styrofoam Plates"
The Photo Album (2001)
There are a lot of venomous DCFC songs, but "Styrofoam Plates" is them at their angriest. Gibbard holds absolutely nothing back as he eviscerates a deadbeat dad at his funeral: "You're a disgrace to the concept of family," he sings. While this chorus-less song is not the catchiest track in the band's catalogue, its biting lyrics makes it one of the most memorable.
Laura Stanley
9. "Bixby Canyon Bridge"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
Gibbard wrote much of Narrow Stairs during a two-week songwriting retreat at a cabin in Big Sur where Jack Kerouac once stayed — and the spirit of Kerouac haunts the album's expansive opener, "Bixby Canyon Bridge." But even if you're not the type of person who keeps a worn out copy of On the Road on hand (and you actively avoid people who do), there's something intoxicating about the dazzling vistas the band conjure on this song. Starting with ghostly guitar tones, the song steadily descends into chaos as the band unleash a weird and wild wall of din. This is just the beginning of the twists and turns of Narrow Stairs.
Laura Stanley
8. "Title Track"
We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes (2000)
The cheekily titled "Title Track" places listeners in the middle of a late-'90s college party where the air is thick with a heady combination of beer, cigarettes and lust. This cut from the band's under-appreciated second record, We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes, is anchored by a lulling but sharp drum beat that hypnotizes listeners just like the song's subject does to Gibbard. Rippling with sexual tension, "Title Track" shows us that sometimes the most subtle-sounding Death Cab songs are their best.
Laura Stanley
7. "Brothers in a Hotel Bed"
Plans (2005)
On Plans' penultimate song, Gibbard's tragic imagery about mourning a lifetime of regret is heart-shattering, to say the least. The slow, haunting keys and pitter-pattering percussion adds to the many layers of cinematic devastation, gently guiding an overwhelming feeling of emptiness toward some level of acceptance. It's incredibly moving and gorgeously delicate, and it's very much Death Cab at their emotional peak.
Chris Gee
6. "A Movie Script Ending"
The Photo Album (2001)
When Death Cab for Cutie were name-checked on The O.C., the band's trajectory altered completely. "A Movie Script Ending" was the first of three songs to be heard over the show's four seasons, when it played on the car stereo, prompting a grump Summer Roberts to describe it as "one guitar and a whole lot of complaining." Admittedly a hilarious summary of a lot of early-aughts rock, the flickering "A Movie Script Ending" is steeped in nostalgia rather than complaints. Like many early Death Cab songs, its vague lyrics offer listeners only glimpses of the plot (a trip back home, twisted bedsheets and headlights on the highway) but it's more than enough to get a sense of a band destined for stardom.
Laura Stanley
5. "What Sarah Said"
Plans (2005)
"What Sarah Said" unfolds like an episode of a medical drama. Tragedy has struck and, as Sarah lies dying, the narrator clings to hope that she will pull through. A pacing piano melody wanders the floor of an ICU waiting room that Gibbard vividly describes right down to its smell: "piss and 409." As the song steadily builds, so too does the optimism, but then Gibbard delivers a weeper of a line: "Love is watching someone die / So who's gonna watch you die?" This isn't the only time Death Cab confronted death on Plans, but, thanks to its evocative imagery, "What Sarah Said" feels genuinely affecting and never melodramatic.
Laura Stanley
4. "Cath…"
Narrow Stairs (2008)
From the ornate, evergreen guitar riff to Gibbard's matter-of-fact lyrics about mistaken love, "Cath…" took the blueprint from the early Death Cab for Cutie days and modernized it for the huge new wave of fans that followed Plans. "Cath…" bursts with luscious energy, cascading with "what-ifs" and sympathetic flourishes — one of the major highlights not only on Narrow Stairs but of the band's entire career.
Chris Gee
3. "Company Calls" / "Company Calls Epilogue"
We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes (2000)
The two-parter masterpiece on Death Cab's second album visits one of Gibbard's favourite settings: a wedding, where he questions love and falling into or out of it within the context of its ultimate celebration. The wiry guitars and stifled lyrics threatening to ruin the joyful event are splayed in cynical fashion during the hectic first act. "Epilogue" employs a more lethargic tone as the drunken bitterness turns into an apathetic, slowcore bent, flipping the phrase "synapse to synapse" onto its head as a way of disconnecting and falling into self-pity.
Chris Gee
2. "Title and Registration"
Transatlanticism (2003)
"The glove compartment is inaccurately named and everybody knows it" might be the most banal yet most memorable opening line in the '00s indie rock universe. What begins as a silly little comment quickly turns into Gibbard grappling with a breakup and using these mundane moments as a distraction from the loneliness. Throughout "Title and Registration," the crystal clear acoustic guitar, combined with a bitcrushed electronic beat (à la the Postal Service), is instantly recognizable, propelling this quintessential Death Cab track.
Chris Gee
1. "Transatlanticism"
Transatlanticism (2003)
"Transatlanticism" is where all of the best parts of Death Cab for Cutie come together. Across nearly eight minutes, Ben Gibbard, alone at the piano at first, unravels a passionate plea to be reunited with his love while Nick Harmer, Chris Walla and Jason McGerr patiently get louder in pitch-perfect harmony with the song's fervency. Gibbard's tender lyrics are wrapped around the monumental sounding instrumentation that the band — then and now — conjure so effortlessly. Often the final song in Death Cab's live show, "Transatlanticism" gives the audience permission to howl their own pain into the night. The ache in this song is so palpable that, 20 years later, "Transatlanticism" is still goosebump-inducing. So, come on.
Laura Stanley