No matter how you look at them, The Decemberists are a completely unique entity in the context of modern rock. Since their first appearance seven years ago, they have won fans that, when put on the spot and asked what is so endearing about the band, couldn’t tell you exactly what they like—they can’t point to any one specific thing—just that they like the music and became fans virtually upon hearing it. Unlike so many acts that have lived, enjoyed a huge base of adoring fans, and died with a popular taste that was “here to stay,” in a very old and unfashionable way (by current industry standards) they’ve been allowed to grow and develop with each successive album into an imposing force in pop that doesn’t owe a debt to any one particular sound or style before them and no one else has attempted to synthesize in spite of its enduring popularity. In a word, The Decemberists are unique in every way; from Colin Meloy’s abstract but oddly relatable writing style to the instrumentation that the music employs to the anachronistically organic way that both the band and its audience have grown. It’s eerie of course, and endearing that a band can function and ultimately find success with a set of antiquated values and methodologies. The end of each album that The Decemberists release is always characteristically open-ended too; as each one winds down, you know that while the chapter is over, the story isn’t and listeners find themselves waiting with baited breath to see where the group will take them next. That excitement and anticipation is seldom seen anymore in the realm of pop and The Decemberists don’t take it for granted—as the years have worn on, the band has deepened the plot and captured more minds. That’s the mark of good writing: when done just right, it’ll capture the imaginations of anyone it comes into contact with and never let go.
The Decemberists
5 Songs EP
(Hush, 2001)
Everyone has to start somewhere but, in retrospect, The Decemberists’ debut EP scarcely hints at what they’d later achieve. Weaving easily between standard-issue coffeehouse guitar changes and a warbling keyboard (“Oceanside”), singer Colin Meloy sets himself up as an even more sensitive and emotionally articulate version of Rivers Cuomo—but without that singer’s ingrained charisma or facility for writing great vocal hooks. The Lou Reed-esque stand-up bass and brass touchings of “Shiny” fare much better, but Meloy has yet to figure out exactly what he wants to do with The Decemberists. While there are hints of the archaic song subjects present (“My Mother Was a Chinese Trapeze Artist”), the instrumentation and song writing are a little too inconsistent and scattered; attempting to condense an LP’s-worth of ideas into five songs. It’s not a bad start, but it only vaguely indicates the triumphs that The Decemberists would later enjoy.
The Decemberists
Castaways & Cutouts
(Killrockstars, 2002)
Less than a year after they released their debut EP, Meloy and The Decemberists had nailed down exactly what they wanted to do with their sound and presented their first great moment in the form of Castaways & Cutouts. The Decemberists’ metamorphosis from loose and honestly pretty poor collegiate scenester rockers to self-assured and comfortable neo-folkies between 5 Songs and Castaways is jaw-dropping as they ditch the emo-leaning attempts at muscular riffing that characterized songs like “Oceanside” on the EP and begin wholeheartedly pursuing the most provincial sounds in folk (accordions, shanties, references to the sea) but simultaneously reinvigorate the style with some youthful enthusiasm and performances that imply homage rather than irony.
All of the elements that would win the band its fan base are already present, in place, accounted for and honed here; while the lackadaisical but dramatic and powerful tempos, Meloy’s now more winsome and longing voice and the instruments seek to play with such themes rather than against them. The first shot in what would be a career marked by broad and sweeping epic records done with indie sensibilities firmly entrenched, the song here showcase a very delicate craft and attention to detail that make each storyboard they create believable; “Grace On Cathedral Hill” longs for a long-passed perfect day full of sun that turns gray and mournful at the realization that there’s no going back while going home again is exactly the reason for the celebration in “July, July!” that also invokes images of beautiful, smiling girls in well-appointed sundresses that wait for our protagonist to return while the players act out a marvelous sort of novella that’s about as light as any band so dramatic could imagine performing.
Castaways & Cutouts makes the most of the lush song constructs combined with instrumental choices both old-fashioned and off-beat to present themselves as a wholly idiosyncratic band that’s neither indie, pop, folk nor emo, but rather a new and unique creature all its own that veers from deep and dramatic to spry and surreal.
The Decemberists
Her Majesty
(Killrockstars, 2003)
Now more confident with the success of their debut LP, Her Majesty is clearly the work of a band that assumes it can throw its weight around a little. From the opening trudge of “Shanty for the Arethusa” listeners can feel the self-assured swagger and atmospherics in gentle arpeggios in “The Gymnasts” and romantic harmonies that resound the whole record through along with a curious sense of self-importance; like the band started reading the glowing reviews of Castaways and took all the praise to heart.
Her Majesty is the closest that The Decemberists have come to a conventional pop or rock record to date. At various points throughout the disc’s runtime, the band tries on The Beatles’ costumes from the Magical Mystery Tour to discover that they fit surprisingly well (“Billy Liar”), swings with Benny and The Jets down on the docks (“Los Angeles, I’m Yours”) and trips the light fantastic from rooftop to rooftop (“The Chimbley Sweep”) all to great effect here, but filling the catbird seat is a job better left to a less intrinsically original band and, while they're having fun and cutting loose here, it really does seem like an anomaly. Her Majesty is, for better or for worse, a “just okay” effort in spite of the fact that The Decemberists were obviously endeavoring to go big or go home here.
The Decemberists
The Tain EP
(Killrockstars, 2005)
…And then they did go big for a short blast and all fans could do was cheer that it didn’t last long. The Tain is a five-track song cycle that finds The Decemberists flexing their conceptual muscles and, while illustrating that they are indeed capable of being a big-time, bombastic arena-rock band, such movements are not the sort of work to which the band is suited. Thrusting Meloy’s guitar right up front and turning up the volume for a little extra crunch while simultaneously deep-sixing all of the extra instrumentation as well as the accompanying dynamic associated with them, what listeners get on The Tain is an example of what The Decemberists could sound like if they were bigger fans of Pink Floyd and wanted to prove it. The problem here is that The Decemberists’ core sound and the sound they’re trying to incorporate into it (namely stoner rock) sit naturally at diametrically opposed odds with each other which forces one to take precedence over the other. Unfortunately, stoner rock wins out here and what listeners get is a product that is still very dramatic, but also very self-absorbed as the band doesn’t bother to feed listeners a little in order to get them to follow along. The Tain, for another band, would be an achievement—the unwieldy thing is well-written—but it isn’t something that The Decemberists could have ever hoped to carry off; it’s too big, overly ambitious and, sadly, fairly two-dimensional—there’s no nuance in spite of its sonic mass and The Decemberists are a band that thrives on nuance.
The Decemberists
Picaresque
(Killrockstars, 2005)
Happily it didn’t take Decemberists long to recover from their curious dalliances in Her Majesty and The Tain but, having absorbed those ideas, the band figures out how to incorporate and balance them with their earlier sound; ultimately concocting a totally new and strange brew from which they coax their rock-solid, drop-dead, best record.
Jumping back and forth between the heartfelt and melodic balladry that they’d long-since perfected on Castaways & Cutouts (songs like “Leslie Anne Levine” and “Clementine” are the prototypes that “Eli, The Barrow Boy,” “The Bagman’s Gambit” and “The Engine Driver” expand upon) but with the benefit of the band’s more experienced air and better-developed characters this time, the record jumps out of stereo speakers much to the thrill of everyone listening. At the same time, the band powers up elsewhere on Picaresque and delivers showers of empathic and textural beauty in positively boisterous and quirky number including “16 Military Wives,” “On the Bus Mall” and “The Mariner’s Revenge Song” and it becomes apparent at that point that the focus of the record is on character development; while The Decemberists have always been careful to include little bits of minutiae in Meloy’s lyrics and the structures of the songs to give their characters and stories more depth, but this time those characters and stories have more depth and literal voice; Petra Hayden as well as Jenny Conlee and Rachel Blumberg grab the mic more here than they have ever done previously in order to give more perspective than just a third-person narrative.
With the characters and backdrops against which they stand fleshed-out and fully-furnished here, Picaresque puts on the best display of talent and pageantry the band has released to date. Picaresque is a classic album as well as a benchmark against which its peers can measure themselves to see how they stack up.
The Decemberists
The Crane Wife
(Capitol, 2006)
After the stellar impression that Picaresque made upon the record-buying public, someone was bound to notice, but in a lot of ways Capitol was too late; the ship had already sailed and The Decemberists had already spiraled off of the Picaresque tack toward numerous undiscovered countries. Not that their major label debut leaves audiences wanting, only that The Decemberists have thrown a considerable amount of distance between themselves and their prior body of work with The Crane Wife. Instantly noticeable is the fact that, under Death Cab commander Chris Walla’s extended guidance and production (he also produced Picaresque), The Decemberists have emerged much more allied with the classic rock greats than ever before. Unlike the dry-run of such experimentations on The Tain, both band and producer have figured out how to inflate The Decemberists’ songs and get their established sound to venture into the realm of conceptual storytelling rather than trying to incorporate sounds established by other bands to try and make it work.
The ghosts of Pink Floyd and The Who manifest in all three parts of the title track as well as in the extended song cycle “The Island,” but the band negotiates its own sort of bigger-than-life bombast here that explodes the stories they’re telling rather than trying to include more technical playing and drawn out passages to drive their conceptual leanings. While it doesn’t always work (“The Perfect Crime” is a little too Pretenders-sounding for its own good), those lapses are far outshined by the great moments here. In an attempt to connect the dots for the faithful too, the band does tread back to Castaways & Cutouts in the offbeat delicacy of “Sons & Daughters” and “Summersong” and, in so doing, they leave the field wide open so that, when they return, they’ll be able to wander with impunity; baiting listeners to stay tuned.
The Decemberists
A Practical Handbook DVD
(Killrockstars, 2007)
A Practical Handbook is actually the ideal descriptor for The Decemberists’ first foray into the DVD medium because the documentary portion of the presentation successfully and completely demystifies the motivations behind this most unusual of unusual modern rock groups. What comes out almost instantly is the fact that The Decemberists got started under the most unusual circumstances and, as time has worn on, sets of strange events and surroundings have yielded the best results for them as well.
The documentary begins with the inception of the band and Colin Meloy starting to write songs with the express purpose of making his girlfriend laugh and progresses through the surreal endeavour that recording Picaresque in a church became to the ins and outs of hitting the road and turning the show loose on very receptive ears. As the footage moves along, it becomes increasingly apparent that these are people that love what they do but, unlike their songs, which can take on very serious and dramatic overtones, those songs and records are more a soundtrack to a production of the theatre of the absurd; while it might sound serious out of context, it’s the most light hearted and goofy thing to behold on stage. It’s exuberant and heart-warming to watch.
As proof, the second half of the DVD showcases a Decemberists show captured toward the end of the Picaresque tour in 2005 at the Roseland Theatre in Portland. The band is in its finest form as the members dive into what should surely be standards in their sets if they haven’t already been designated as such including “16 Military Wives,” “The Mariner’s Revenge Song,” “The Chimbley Sweep” and “The Soldiering Life” and gives the performances that those uninitiated to The Decemberists’ live experience would hope it would be. The concert is theatrical, goofy and fun—the best imaginable exposition that fans could hope for from the band.
Rounding out the DVD is a collection of outtake goofs that are laughable and brief as well as a collection of the band’s music videos that are, again, really funny and silly—giving credence to the theory that not all entertaining things need have something dire at their core. This program illustrates that not all good things have to be serious at all; as The Decemberists illustrate, sometimes all you need is a smart sense of humor.
Colin Meloy
Sings Live!
(Killrockstars, 2008)
After four full-length records from The Decemberists showcasing their quirky songwriting and penchant for deceptively ornate and multi-layered productions as well as a DVD that wonderfully illustrates the fun that the band has onstage, the reasonable question would be to ask what would happen if it was all stripped away and the craft of the songs was left to sink or swim on its own. Can it still be fun and goofy with only one set of hands involved? Armed with only his hefty songbook and an acoustic guitar, Colin Meloy did a two-week national tour—something he hasn’t done since before The Decemberists formed—and laid those questions to rest definitively with Sings Live! In this context, The Decemberists’ frontman draws listeners in with a sing-along vibe that a party of friends could easily have around a campfire (precisely the type he was trying to create—he says so himself at one point) and holds them captivated as he lovingly strips such songs as “The Engine Driver,” “On The Bus Mall” and “A Cautionary Tale” down to their essences but illustrates that it is the strength of the compositions themselves—not the frills—that make the songs special. Sings Live! is not a Decemberists album and isn’t designed to be; it is simply a fantastic look at the band’s songwriter laying down what he knows best. Meloy presents his songs and personality warts, gaffes and all (check “Dracula’s Daughter” for an example) and, in so doing, finds a way to relate to his audience on a human level; this presentation is set up as a guy playing for his friends rather than something so formal as "audience" and "performer." And it works—Sings Live! turns out to be a fantastic and intimate way to hear these songs that have always been relentlessly intimate, but also always clouded with accouterments. This disc betrays a sweetness that Meloy’s albums with The Decemberists don’t—this is a labor of love.
The Decemberists
The Hazards Of Love
(Capitol, 2009)
With The Hazards Of Love, The Decemberists have turned an all-new corner in both their music and careers. Sure – all of the band's previous albums regularly relied upon theatrical musings and dramatic movements within their respective run-times, but those compositions more closely resembled vignettes or one-act plays at most, with short story arcs. That brevity may have been due in part to the obvious monetary constraints that come with working on an indie label but, historically, the band always made the most of what they had and won their name, reputation and eventually a major label deal on that strength. Signing with a major gave The Decemberists a little more leeway and the luxury of having the time to really get ambitious though, and they've really run with that on The Hazards Of Love – they band's first genuine, full-bore, big-time theatrical and dramatic production.
Listeners know they're in for a new, bigger and more ambitious Decemberists from the moment they discover that they have to wait for nearly a minute after the record starts playing to hear anything at all. The gradual build of keyboards and strings after that first minute of “Prelude” let listeners know that they can indeed expect something that means to be epic in its' plotting, and it's impossible not to notice the little hairs on the back of one's neck stand up in anticipation as The Hazards Of Love seems to promise that it will be the great logical extension of The Decemberists' storytelling arc that began seven years prior on Castaways and Cutouts. Will this indeed be it?
No, the nicest, most polite way to say it is that The Hazards Of Love both is and isn't the best, most gratifying sort of album that this major label incarnation of The Decemberists could offer fans. On one hand, it's interesting to see the band realize the great dramatic form of indie rock they've been developing for the last seven years (the title track is broken into four parts interspersed throughout the album's run-time) and wield the explosive sonics that an enormous production budget can offer with such authority (the explosive, enormous guitar sound of “A Bower Scene” can take a listener's breath away). On the other hand, where The Decemberists previously mixed carefully designed and measured substance with dramatic style in their songs, that balance is clearly upset on The Hazards Of Love; there's a lot of style, but not much in the way of substance.
Unfortunately, it appears that while the band was taking its' time to orchestrate a grandiose album, they neglected to write a great number of strong individual songs for The Hazards Of Love. Fans hoping to get some good indie rock songs from THOL as they did from Picaresque will be left disappointed. While the album has some great build and promise in songs like “Isn't It A Lovely Night,” “The Rake's Song” and “Annan Water,” the record doesn't really go anywhere other than in circles because to many of the songs interconnect; sometimes one wants to scream, “Get on with it already!” as they find themselves forced to revisit themes and designs that seemed like drama for drama's sake in the first place. The album never exactly moves past that point, and The Hazards Of Love ends up devolving quickly into a set of inchoate song cycles – and weak ones at that.
So what went wrong with The Hazards Of Love? Well, what has always made Decemberists albums work is the fact that, while there have been story-lines running through the band's albums before, there have also been great pop songs to enjoy along the way through – and there just aren't here.
The Decemberists
The King Is Dead
(Capitol, 2011)
It took a surprisingly long time for The Decemberists to get comfortable enough on a major label to be themselves, but the band has returned to its' finest form on The King Is Dead. To be fair, it's not like The Crane Wife and The Hazards Of Love were bad records per se, they were just too large and epic for their own good. The Decemberists have always shone brightest when they're nestled in the modest confines with smaller production budgets; they're at their best doing community theater, not Broadway. That smaller scale is what fans have always found accessible and endearing about albums like Picaresque, Castaways and Cutouts and Her Majesty the Decemberists, and that's the level to which The Decemberists have returned on The King Is Dead. Listeners will be able to mark the band's reversion to simpler working practices from the moment “I Can't Carry It All” draws the curtains open on the record – and they won't be able to stop themselves from smiling, gratified, through the album's entire run-time.
The smiles on every listener's face are deserved too – because the returns on The King Is Dead are great and many. Instantly noticeable initially is that the band's favorite playthings – images of sea voyage adventure and frontier-building ambition and the romance of it all – are back, and presented with vibrant enthusiasm and infectious excitement. The King Is Dead is a glorious return.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves here. Some listeners may balk and say that The Decemberists revisiting old strengths as they are on their sixth studio album implies that the band has run out of ideas. That is not the case at all though; each track on The King Is Dead comes through fresh and new because they also present elements of growth. Here, the band includes the solid, more self-assured writing style that was featured on The Hazards Of Love, thereby making not it exactly like anything the band has done before, but an improved version of the band's original focus. That change is great, but even more engaging is the improved mood reflected in the album; unlike the dark and even dour shadows that The Hazards Of Love often cast, there is a more upbeat and brighter coloring streaked through songs like “Rise To Me,” “Calamity Song,” “January Hymn” and “All Arise” that is absolutely beguiling when it's coupled as it is here with an evocative, Georgia Country-touched backdrop. That said, while The Decemberists have always implied adventure and sights which would be exciting to witness in their songs, The King Is Dead is the most exciting and adventurous release in the group's catalogue to date and it seems to achieve that stature effortlessly. More than The Crane Wife or The Hazards Of Love, it could be said that The King Is Dead is the next big step in The Decemberists' career; here, they prove that they can take the experience they've accrued over their career and apply it to music that is unmistakably in line with sounds immediately associated with themselves and themselves alone. That means the album is a very unique landmark in the band's catalogue.
Artist:
www.decemberists.com
Download:
The Decemberists – “The Engine Driver” – Picaresque – [mp3]
The Decemberists – “The Soldiering Life” – Her Majesty – [mp3]
The Decemberists – “Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect” – Castaways & Cutouts – [mp3]
The Decemberists – "Down By The Water" – The King Is Dead – [mp3]
Albums:
The King Is Dead comes out on January 18, 2011. Pre-order it here on Amazon . Much of the rest of The Decemberists' catalogue remains in print. Buy it here on Amazon .
