You can be forgiven for thinking you\u2019ve wandered into a Tom Petty album when the opening harmonica and midtempo stomp of \u201cDon\u2019t Carry It All\u201d blasts out of the speakers. It\u2019s not that the song bears more than a passing resemblance to \u201cYou Don\u2019t Know How It Feels\u201d as much as it is the straightforward, loud production, clarion playing and understandable vocals seems quite far removed from The Crane Wife<\/i>. Maybe that\u2019s the point.<\/p>\n
The Oregon band\u2019s sixth album is a departure from their sound toward the commercial and netted a radio hit in the stomping, harmonica-filled \u201cDown By the Water,\u201d which remains one of their best songs and helps make this album a great starting point into this indie rock band. In keeping with the Americana tradition, nods to folk rock and R.E.M. abound throughout the disc, not only on the chiming guitar fills of \u201cCalamity Song\u201d but by the fact that the Georgia band\u2019s guitarist Peter Buck guests on three tracks here, including \u201cCalamity Song,\u201d and you\u2019ll recognize that twang immediately.<\/p>\n
Indeed, the Decemberists always seemed to sound British, or at least attempt to, but this is the first time they really explored American roots music of a type, and it\u2019s a comfortable fit on Colin Meloy. The flat-out country guitar fills of \u201cRise To Me\u201d are nothing like the band had attempted before and \u201cRox in the Box\u201d is a solid blend of country and folk rock, with accordion underpinnings to boot, perhaps the only stock Decemberists sound on the disc. <\/p>\n
Problem is, the songwriting seems more concerned with nailing the sound and feel than with memorable melodies and hooks. There\u2019s a definite mood here and the disc sounds good if you\u2019re in that frame of mind, but more often than not only \u201cDown By the Water\u201d and maybe \u201cCalamity Song\u201d will really stick in your head. However, two moody pieces saved for the end of the record are uniformly strong, \u201cJune Song\u201d and particularly \u201cThis Is Why We Fight,\u201d a driving acoustic alt-rocker with a good, too-short guitar solo.<\/p>\n
At 10 songs and 40 minutes, the Decemberists have trimmed the excess from previous discs and seem to have left behind the storytelling and prog-rock of the 2000s for a new approach. The King Is Dead <\/i>is not a great record, but its low-key charms and obvious love of Americana makes it appealing all the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":32970,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9567],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-44751","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-decemberists","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44751"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}