The Decemberists sound comfortable and loose on
The King Is Dead in a way that reminds me of
Wilco’s
Blue Sky. Like Wilco, the Decemberists are highly ambitious and constantly reaching for something new and pushing their fanbase to follow. Granted, where Wilco experimented with distortion and found sounds, the Decemberist headed deep into the library with a hand on the Thesaurus. Here it sounds as if they’ve taken a deep breath, deciding to simply play together and write 10 good songs. Apparently, when they drop all pretension, they still write catchy indie rock, just with a little more country and roots flavor. And it works exceedingly well, especially on tracks like “Calamity Song” with its countrified New Order guitar riff and Irish folk leaning “Rox In The Box”. It may not be the type of album that sets the world on fire, but it makes for great repeat listening.
6 Comments:
Thanks for reviewing this. Now I am even more excited for it to come out!!
DUDE, it is $3.99 on Amazon.com today.
"...countrified New Order guitar riff." Nice, thanks! This phrase actually makes me want to queue it up more than before.
I was hoping Brasilliant would add some Colin Meloy bashing to your post... I'm always entertained by it! There's still time for that though ;)
No Colin Meloy bashing for this album from me. Believe me, I was skeptical when Awmercy played it for the first time.
However, it seems as though he managed to stop kissing his own ass for a stretch, resulting in what may be my favorite album of 2011 (already).
It was my most-anticipated album of 2011 and so far it's living up to that. It's more mellow than some of the other albums, but quite enjoyable.
So as the your most anticipated album, did it live up to your expectations?
Or was the mellower tone a curve ball that will brush back your final assessment?
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