The Decemberists - The Hazards of Love
Indie Rock
2009
What Colin Meloy has done with The Decemberists over the course of the past eight years is nothing short of astounding. What started as an EP in 2001 has evolved into something wonderful, majestic even. Rooted in indie rock but with obvious folk and prog influences, the band’s craft has become impossible to put a finger on recently, and with the release of
The Hazards of Love they’ve become even more unclassifiable.
The most unique facet of the record is how it completes the journey that the band started with
The Crane Wife while being something entirely different from anything they’ve ever done at the same time. It continues the logical transition to being more prog, its very existence as a ‘rock opera’ being a trademarked element of the genre, but at the same time, this change is a dichotomy. While all of their albums to date have been approachable as both song-by-song and whole experiences, this one isn’t worth a lot when digested as the dissolution of its parts.
And that’s not to infer that there are no worthwhile songs here. There are many. It’s just that when you’ve got a 17 song, hour-long album and only a handful of individual tunes that stand by themselves, clearly other methods of listening were intended. Amongst the best of the exceptions to this trend are “The Hazards of Love 1”, which sounds like a cool nursery rhyme, and “The Wanting Comes in Waves/Repaid”, which is groovy as hell. It benefits immeasurably from the contributions of Shara Worden, who was invited to provide guest vocals on the album alongside a hoard of other contributors.
I cannot express just how well executed the record is. Normally, an album with so many songs and so many changes in momentum as its concept advances itself would probably get boring, but this one avoids that pitfall. I’ll admit that there are times when you wish it would just get on with it, but mostly, it’s a damn good time. Everytime I’ve given the thing a spin, I’ve derived the most enjoyment from the music by simply pressing play and letting myself get lost in the dense layers that shroud the disc. You’ve got pianos. You’ve got accordions. You’ve got backing vocals coming from all directions. They pulled out all the stops for this one, as usual.
But, know that despite all of these instruments and schemes, the album doesn’t get so pretentious that it ever starts to annoy you. Yes, it’s probably self-indulgent, but what drives each song is the purest melody, not any grandiose aspiration of being epic. “The Hazards of Love 4”, most prominently, is so affecting because of how original the writing is. Meloy doesn’t have all that unique a voice, but you always know that it’s him singing because no one else does it quite like The Decemberists. No one else hooks you so subtlety.
I say it rarely, but The Decemberists are a compulsory band. Here, they continue their string of great releases, although
Hazards probably isn’t as good as
The Crane Wife. As mentioned above, those albums are perfect compliments to eachother, the latter starting the progression that the former would complete while being entirely unlike it. I’m not going to try to be original here; I’ve heard it said on multiple occasions that the most impressive feat achieved by The Decemberists’ discography is that every album is different to the last, but certain qualities are retained that help them defend their title as the world’s best indie(-esque) band, while still allowing them to branch out. How true that statement is.
****1/2 (out of five)
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