King James Version is the second studio album by American rock band Harvey Danger. It was released on September 12, 2000, through . It was the band's only album recorded for a major label, and their last with drummer Evan Sult. Written and recorded over the span of 16 months with producer John Goodmanson, the album marked a substantial departure from the lo-fi sound of the band's debut, Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? (1997); it encompassed a variety of rock music styles and explored "the conflict between faith and skepticism". Although the bulk of the album's material was recorded in March and April 1999, work on the album continued periodically until February 2000 due to a dispute surrounding Harvey Danger's contract, which delayed its release.

The album spawned two singles: "Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo", which reached number 27 on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart, and "Authenticity". King James Version received favourable reviews from critics, who praised the band's musical growth. Due to a lack of promotional support, sales were extremely poor; by December 2004, it had sold only 25,000 copies in the United States. As a result, Harvey Danger disbanded at the end of the album's supporting tour in April 2001. Despite its commercial failure, King James Version gradually attained a cult following and critical acclaim in the years following its release, and was later named one of the best albums of the 2000s by PopMatters. Harvey Danger performed the album in its entirety for one show in 2008.

Background In 1997, Harvey Danger released their debut studio album, Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone?, through the Arena Rock Recording Company. Although the album was not a commercial success, major labels engaged in a bidding war to sign Harvey Danger after the album's second track, "Flagpole Sitta", began receiving airplay from several college radio stations and Los Angeles-based KROQ. The band subsequently signed with London Recordings' Slash Records imprint in May 1998, shortly after they hired Arena Rock owner Greg Glover.Reece 1998, p. 13 Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? was reissued by Slash/London the following month to great commercial success, largely due to "Flagpole Sitta"; the album went on to sell over 500,000 copies in the United States, and in February 1999 was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).Behrman 2000, p. 41 "Private Helicopter" was issued as the album's second single in October 1998,Anon. 1998, p. 93 but it did not make an impact on any singles charts. Shortly thereafter, Harvey Danger ceased touring and returned to Seattle in November 1998.Behrman 2000, p. 42

Upon returning to Seattle, Harvey Danger went on a short hiatus during the winter holiday season. The band briefly considered breaking up, but decided against it, and began writing new material for their next album in November 1998. The album was initially envisioned as a "dour, mellow anti-pop" record. The band's new material was more experimental and less commercial-sounding than their prior output. The band intended to distance themselves from "Flagpole Sitta", which they thought had marked them as a one-hit wonder and a "major label fabrication" because of its ironic lyrics, which frontman Sean Nelson believed listeners had taken at "face value". Nelson further explained:

Recording and production Harvey Danger finished recording demos for King James Version in February 1999. Thereafter, in early March 1999, the band travelled to Woodstock, New York, to record with producer John Goodmanson at Bearsville Sound. At Bearsville, the band recorded the album's basic tracks and some overdubs, before ultimately deciding to return to Seattle to record the rest of the album. "[I]t felt like we were spending a lot of money just so we could say we recorded at Bearsville. It wasn't necessarily making us play better. So we went back home to do the rest", Nelson stated. Recording continued into late April 1999 at John & Stu's Place in Seattle and at Bear Creek Studio in Woodinville, Washington, where additional overdubs were recorded to give the album "more breadth, [and] some more colors". On May 17, 1999, Harvey Danger mixed King James Version at The Village Recorder in Los Angeles.

Harvey Danger had hoped to release King James Version in August or September 1999, but owing to a series of corporate mergers and restructurings, the album was indefinitely delayed. Universal Music Group (UMG), which had merged with London Recordings' parent company PolyGram in December 1998, had sold London Recordings' US division to Warner Music Group. Then, in August 1999, Warner Music Group announced that it would be merging London with its Sire Records Group to create London-Sire Records. Shortly thereafter, a dispute arose between London-Sire and UMG over the rights to Harvey Danger's contract, resulting in the band being moved into a "corporate black hole" at UMG. The contractual dispute prevented Harvey Danger from recording and touring, and the band was forced to turn down an offer to open for The Pretenders. London-Sire also owed Harvey Danger hundreds of thousands of dollars, and Goodmanson, who allowed Harvey Danger to record at John & Stu's on the belief that he would be quickly reimbursed, took a financial hit; he was later compensated in full by the band. Nelson later stated that he felt "morose" and "suicidally depressed" throughout 1999 as a result of the album's delays.

During the band's corporate struggles, the members of Harvey Danger put the album on hold and worked on individual projects. When the band came back and revisited the album with a different perspective, they decided to continue working on King James Version. During what Nelson described as the album's "second gestation period", parts of King James Version were revised, and three new songs—"Meetings With Remarkable Men (Show Me the Hero)", "Humility on Parade" and "Loyalty Bldg."—were recorded for the album. Recording was completed in late February 2000, and in June 2000, the band re-mixed/mixed the majority of the album's tracks at The Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, B.C. Nelson later remarked that Harvey Danger had "finished" King James Version three times during 1999 and 2000.

Composition

Music Musically, King James Version has been described as indie rock, alternative rock and pop rock. Reviews also noted that the album was influenced by power pop, rockabilly, glam rock and punk rock. In contrast to the band's debut album, King James Version features a less grungy and lo-fi sound, and uses a wider variety of instruments, including keyboards, piano and pump organ. Guitarist Jeff J. Lin, a classically trained musician, composed cello and viola arrangements for the album, which were played by members of the Seattle Symphony. Nelson's vocal performances were compared to Chuck Berry, Robert Smith and Richard Hell.

Speaking with Yahoo!'s LAUNCH, Nelson labelled the album a middle ground between "catchy rock" and "very quiet, pretty songs". "Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo" was described by Billboard as featuring a "laid-back feel complete with 80's retro guitar effects."Taylor (ed.) 2000, p. 36 "(Theme from) Carjack Fever" is a reworked version of "Carjack Fever", an early Harvey Danger song first recorded in 1995, which later appeared in an unfinished state and played in reverse as a hidden track on Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone?. "Pike St./Park Slope" is a sombre piano ballad and was compared to the works of Ben Folds and John Lennon's "Imagine". "Underground" is a "radically-rearranged" cover of a song by the Seattle band This Busy Monster.

The overall atmosphere and direction of King James Version was, in part, informed by the English rock band Radiohead and their 1997 album OK Computer. After hearing about the album's success, which Nelson described as the "ultimate one-hit wonder redemption narrative", Harvey Danger decided to experiment with their sound and make a "great leap forward, artistically, and do something really ambitious" in order to maintain their credibility. The band was ultimately unable to emulate Radiohead's creative and technical process, resulting in stripped-back arrangements. Nelson stated, "It certainly was no OK Computer, though there are a couple of moments where we obviously are reaching for that kind of faux-epic sound. I’ve listened to King James Version a lot and I don’t know what the hell it sounds like."

Lyrics

The heavily philosophical and ambiguous lyrics on King James Version, written by Sean Nelson, primarily discuss "the conflict between faith and skepticism". The album's lyrics are often humorous, cynical, sarcastic or deadpan, and they reference historical popular culture, literature and places. Various popular figures and musicians, such as Jesus, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nathanael West, the Malboro Man and Morrissey are mentioned on the album's tracks. The band has described the lyrics as using multiple literary devices, including first person and multiple perspectives and unreliable narrators; sometimes, the album employs dialogues. Nelson described the album as being "very personal, but not autobiographical", and "more in the way of character study than autobiographical revelation". The album's opening track, "Meetings with Remarkable Men (Show Me the Hero)", is about a man "looking for somebody to be a disciple of. Jesus doesn't work, Morrissey doesn't work, and Kip Winger is the only one who provides a voice of reason".Weisbard 2000, p. 162 "Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo" directly alludes to Sweetheart of the Rodeo by The Byrds, and also references "Lonesome Cowboy Bill" by The Velvet Underground.Pappademas 2000, p. 21

The referential nature of King James Version's lyrics was inspired by the works of Frederic Tuten, an American novelist known for his style of referencing to the past via the present. Nelson stated, "I feel that's a huge part of listening to rock n' roll music. As a listener, when I want to talk about anything with my friends, I can casually say half a line from any of a hundred songs and they know exactly what I'm talking about. I don't have to elucidate the sentiment any further. It's admitting rock songs can be a response to rock songs, and not necessarily be just so referential that they're just about rock songs." Nelson thanks Tuten in the album's liner notes, as well as novelist Philip Roth and Le Show by Harry Shearer. To further connect with the album's recurring theme of referencing other musicians and people, King James Version features an array of backup vocalists, including Grant Lee Buffalo's Grant-Lee Phillips and Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard, in order to "reflect many, many voices". Nelson deliberately avoided writing about Harvey Danger's struggles with success, believing the subject to be "stupid and irrelevant to most people that listen to music".

Title and packaging The title is both a reference to the King James Version of the Bible, and to the album's "second gestation period". Nelson described the album's title as referring to "coming through a convoluted process and arriving at a version of the album and the band that feels sort of definitive". The album's artwork, done by Tae Won Yu, was described by Nelson as an expression of the "band's fractured mental and psychic state, or relationship to ourselves, our city, our project, and each other."

Release and promotion