It starts with that triplet of notes on a cheap-sounding synthesizer. It’s thin, almost plastic, and totally unassuming. Then the drums kick in with a stumble—a literal mistake by Arlen Thompson that they kept in the final take because it felt more "real"—and suddenly you’re moving. By the time Dan Boeckner screams about being "scared of the light," you aren't just listening to a song from 2005. You’re experiencing the peak of the Montreal indie rock explosion. Wolf Parade I'll Believe in Anything isn't just a track; it is a frantic, sweaty, desperate pillar of the mid-aughts.
If you were lurking on music blogs or Pitchfork back then, you remember the hype. Montreal was the center of the universe. The Arcade Fire had just released Funeral, and the world was looking for what came next. Wolf Parade was the answer, but they were the grittier, messier sibling. While Funeral was orchestral and grand, Apologies to the Queen Mary—the album featuring this track—was recorded in a basement with Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse producing. It sounded like it was falling apart. That’s why it worked.
The Beautiful Mess of the Production
Isaac Brock’s influence on the sound of Wolf Parade I'll Believe in Anything cannot be overstated. He didn't want a clean record. He wanted the spit and the grit. There’s a story from the sessions at Les Studios Breakglass where the band was basically living on beer and adrenaline. You can hear it in the mix. The vocals are pushed right to the edge of clipping.
Spencer Krug and Dan Boeckner were the two-headed monster at the front of this band. Krug wrote the "odd" songs—the ones about ghosts, skeletons, and labyrinths. Boeckner wrote the "rock" songs. But "I'll Believe in Anything" is a Krug masterpiece that manages to bridge both worlds. It has the weirdness of Krug’s frantic keyboard lines, but it carries the anthemic weight of a stadium rock song. Honestly, it’s one of the few songs from that era that sounds better the louder you play it, mostly because the distortion feels intentional, like a physical weight.
People often forget that the song actually evolved from an earlier version. Before the Apologies version, there was a recording by Spencer Krug’s other project, Sunset Rubdown. That version, found on Snake's Got a Leg, is much more skeletal. It’s interesting, sure, but it lacks the explosive catharsis that the full band brought to the table. When the rest of Wolf Parade got their hands on it, they turned a quirky art-pop song into a genuine anthem.
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Decoding the Lyrics: What is "I'll Believe in Anything" Actually About?
Krug has always been a bit of a cryptic lyricist. He’s not the guy to write a straightforward "I love you" song. Instead, he gives us lines like "I'll take you where the eagle has no eye." What does that even mean?
On the surface, it’s a plea for belief in a world that feels increasingly fragmented. There’s a desperation to the chorus: "Give me your eyes, I need sunshine." It feels like someone begging for a different perspective because their own is too dark to bear. Some critics at the time suggested it was a commentary on the cynicism of the early digital age, but Krug has often leaned more toward the mythological and the personal.
It’s about the desire to find something—anything—to latch onto.
The repetition is the key. When he shouts "Nobody knows you" over and over again, it’s not meant to be an insult. It’s an observation of isolation. You’re alone, I’m alone, but if we believe in the same thing, maybe we aren't. It’s a very "mid-20s crisis" sentiment. It captured the exact feeling of being young in 2005, stuck between the analog world we grew up in and the digital chaos that was starting to take over.
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Why the Song Never Ages
You’ve probably noticed that a lot of indie rock from that era hasn't aged well. A lot of it sounds thin or overly "twee." But Wolf Parade I'll Believe in Anything avoids that trap. Why?
- The Drumming: Arlen Thompson’s performance is massive. He plays like he’s trying to break the kit. The fills are counter-intuitive and heavy.
- The Lack of Polish: Because they didn't use the over-compressed, "radio-ready" sound of the time, the record doesn't feel dated. It sounds like a band playing in a room.
- The Vocal Sincerity: There is zero irony in Krug’s delivery. In a decade defined by "hipster irony," this song was dead serious.
The Legacy of Apologies to the Queen Mary
Wolf Parade eventually went on hiatus, then came back, then lost a member (Dante DeCaro), then kept going. They’ve made several great albums since, like At Mount Zoomer and Expo 86. But they are forever tied to this specific moment in time.
The album Apologies to the Queen Mary was recently given a deluxe reissue by Sub Pop, and it’s worth revisiting the liner notes if you can get your hands on them. They detail the chaos of the recording process—how they were signed to Sub Pop almost immediately, how they felt the pressure of the Montreal "scene" tag, and how they almost broke up several times before the first record was even out.
The track "I'll Believe in Anything" remains their most-streamed song by a long shot. It’s the one everyone waits for at the live shows. It’s the one that makes people in their 40s now jump around like they’re 21 again. There’s a specific kind of magic in a song that can bottle up a specific era while still feeling relevant to a new listener in 2026.
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How to Listen Now
If you want the full experience, don't just stream it on your phone speakers. This is a "headphone song." You need to hear the way the keyboards pan across the stereo field during the bridge. You need to hear the way the bass guitar (played by Dan Boeckner) provides that driving, motoric pulse that keeps the whole thing from floating away.
I’d also suggest finding the live KEXP versions on YouTube. Seeing the band perform it live—Krug hunched over his keys, Boeckner shaking with energy—gives you a much better sense of why this song hit so hard. It wasn't a studio trick. It was a physical outburst.
Practical Steps for the Modern Listener
To truly appreciate what Wolf Parade accomplished with this track, you should dive into the ecosystem that created it. It wasn't an isolated incident; it was part of a specific creative fever.
- Listen to the Sunset Rubdown Version: Compare the version of "I'll Believe in Anything" from Snake's Got a Leg to the Wolf Parade version. It helps you see how a band's chemistry changes a songwriter's initial vision.
- Explore the "Montreal Sound" Contemporaries: Queue up Funeral by Arcade Fire and Set Yourself on Fire by Stars. These three albums together provide the definitive map of 2004-2005 Montreal.
- Check out the 2016 Remaster: Sub Pop released a remastered version for the 10th anniversary. It cleans up some of the mud in the low end without losing the "basement" feel that makes the song special.
- Follow the Branches: If you like Krug’s side of the song, look into Moonface. If you prefer Boeckner’s grit, check out Handsome Furs or Operators. The DNA of this song is scattered across twenty different projects.
Wolf Parade managed to capture a very specific lightning in a bottle. They took the anxiety of the early 2000s and turned it into a shout-along chorus. It’s messy, it’s loud, and it’s perfectly imperfect. That is exactly why we are still talking about it two decades later.