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Underground > Radio & Music >

The Decemberists

01:23 / 18.05.06

The Decemberists are a five-piece band from Portland Oregon who are well known for their story-telling style of music and their wide range of musical instruments.

Colin Meloy, the singer and possibly main songwriter has a very distinct warble that makes me think of Irish folk singers, rather than a rock singer. They also abandon the angst, turmoil and hate in order to explore complex emotions through role-playing. In one epic song, a son seeks out the man responsible for ruining his family after the mother passes away. He gets a job on a large boat and this boat gets into a skirmish with another boat with the prey on it... coincidentally. Then the boats get swallowed by a mighty whale leaving only the two men alive.... Epic story-telling.

Colin Meloy is a huge fan of traditional songs and arrangements and lyrics, giving a lot of his songs a very old-timey feel. His diction within songs makes one think of Charles Dickens or a more conversational version of Henry James. Even looking at their album covers, they have an old-timey, nautical feel:

The first LP from the band.

They use a wide variety of instruments, such as an accordian, a violin, a melodica. The bassist is Petra Haden, who recently released a bizarre a capella version of The Who Sells Out. And Colin Meloy used to be the frontman for Tarkio, if you've ever heard of them.

I love the Decemberists because they tell a fascinating story in a very unique and original way. There are not many artists out there who can capture the traditional feel the way that The Decemberists do.

And, Colin Meloy is hot:

13:01 / 20.05.06

bump

13:40 / 20.05.06

I´ve got their record "Picaresque" and really like it. My two favourite songs are Eli, The Barrowboy and We Both Go Down Together.

They remind mne of Belle and Sebastian. B&S are uplifting and frolicky, The Decemberists are more melancholy, but somehow more meat and potatoes, less fluffy.

It´s always difficult for me to describe music. I imagine them playing in a rustical pub hundredfifty years ago.

All Acting Regiment

15:33 / 20.05.06

Oh dear. I'm afraid I've been a bit of a contrary mary on your other thread, Matt, and I'm going to be one here too.

Firstly- I think all of the classic old folk songs are immenseley powerful through the circumstances of their creation/honing over time- poverty, death, war, serious business- all these things strip away layers of un-needed stuff to reveal the (air quotes) pure innards.

I just feel, however, that when the Decembrists do it there's a strong whiff of Twee- this goes for their "old-timey" album art as well. It doesn't feel like the Pogues playing an Irish folk song, it feels like a vaguely reactionary rejection of the noise and sex of the modern pop world for some sort of idealised, semi-intellectual, comfortable past-ness.

01:01 / 21.05.06

it feels like a vaguely reactionary rejection of the noise and sex of the modern pop world for some sort of idealised, semi-intellectual, comfortable past-ness.

I certainly think you've said it better than I could ever hope to, and that you said something that tickled at the back of my brain, but I have to be a contrary mary to this.

I don't think it's so awful that Meloy rejects the information age world. I acquired a bootleg of a solo show the man did, which was also broadcasted on Internet radio, and he made a big to-do about not using the Internet or computers really. I struck me as one of those moments when people are proud they've never watched Star Trek. By that I mean, it's being... rejecting for the sake of rejecting. But that's Meloy's take on technology.

His music, however, is like a breath of old-timey air, in a world of commercial, artificial and computerized music. Wow. Wait, that sounded totally arse-y. I don't know, Legba. I just like 'em, okay?

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

14:55 / 21.05.06

I like Picaresque, but I don't love it, mainly because the Decemberists hover somewhere between "legitimately quirky" (They Might Be Giants and Primus being the biggest examples I can think of offhand of people that are offbeat but wear it well, and it works) and "novelty band". But I suspect if I were listening to TMBG or Primus or Belle and Sebatian as new bands today, they'd stike me the same way.

I'm in a "cautious like" category, because I have to hear more before I can fit Picaresque into a body of work. At the moment, it's a sort of fun, smart novelty, but without more Decemberists context, it sort of flows in one ear and out the other. It's great while I'm listening, but nothing gets retained.

By contrast, I picked up Picaresque the same week as Frog Eyes' The Golden River, and I found while I enjoyed the Decemberists more as a fun band on the first listen, it's Frog Eyes that I keep coming back to, because they run through twee and past cute and leap over Aren't I Clever Creek to dash naked into the fields of Batshit Insane, and then come back to splash around in Aren't I Clever Creek again.

14:08 / 23.05.06

I fucking loathe the Decemberists.

And I doubley fucking loathe knuckleheads who keep telling me I should listen to them whenever I express my appreciation of Neutral Milk Hotel.

(this message brought to you by the rizla foundation for constructive posting)

14:19 / 23.05.06

Is it because of the reasons Legba already stated? Or are you just another contrary mary?

14:37 / 23.05.06

Legba puts it quite nicely, yes.

I put it more like QUIRKY & SELF-SATISFIED = Get out of my house!

All Acting Regiment

19:20 / 23.05.06

I should add that I don't begrudge them for doing what they do, or begrudge their fans for liking it.

I mean, I was listening to them recently, to make sure I didn't spout bollocks on this very thread, and one thing that's struck me is that one bit in one of the songs where the verse ends on a minor cadence saying Chimbly, chimbly boyyyy...

And it made me think, you know, these are people living in a world where there are no chimney boys, and where replacing "chimney" with "chimbley" makes the word a lot more chincey and olde-worlde than it needs to be.

It's a very good name for a band though.

Korso Jerusalem

19:37 / 23.05.06

Oh good. More people who can't stand them.
Up here in New Hampshire, these bastards rein king among the hipster hordes. I, personally, am so fucking sick of twee that it hurts. Okay, sure, you made your point about the overblown tough guy images of modern rock, now just LET IT DIE. Twee is a bit like Dada, very useful and entertaining at first but a redundant and irritating movement in the end.

If I want "old-timey", I'll listen to Tom Waits' Mule Variations.