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The Decemberists – The King Is Dead
With a band like The Decemberists, it’s all about the craft of song writing. The band’s leader Colin Meloy has a real way with words and throughout the band’s ten-year history, he has written some very memorably songs. The group also has an experimental side that keeps things interesting for both fan and band. The band’s accessible side reached its zenith with the two middle albums Picaresque and The Crane Wife and the immediacy of both of those sets of songs broke the band into the big time.
After those two easier to digest works, the band threw their fans a curve ball with the musically dense and intricately arranged work, The Hazards Of Love. It’s interesting to note when that album was released it was described as challenging but is now considered misguided after it did little to expand the band’s fan base. Fast forward to 2011 and the press is describing the new album, The King Is Dead as a return to a more simple and pure song writing approach with an even country tinge. For the fans of progressive rock and music of the more adventurist nature, what does this mean?
The song cycle of The King Is Dead on first listen comes across a little conservative (by the band’s more experimental standards) but with a songwriter that has the talents of Meloy there is always more under the surface. The depth of instrumentation is as expansive as ever and with the country tilt of this work there are the obligatory sounds of accordions, pedal steel guitars and mandolins added to the mix. There is also the sublime addition of Gillian Welch helping on harmonies. Even Peter Buck drops by and does his best R.E.M. impression to add to a series of songs already familiar in sound to the output of that Athens, Georgia band.
This work is a grower and by taming down the eccentricities (at least arrangement wise) it might find its way into a few new fans’ collections. For long time devotees it’s a series of songs that initially appeal but might take some time to join the classics from the past.
Rob Hudson
www.decemberists.com
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