The Decemberists - The Hazards Of Love Review

Posted by Jon Kinsey on 03.27.2009

The Decemberists new release sees them stray from their roots to release a rock tinged concept album. Does the sea change lift them to a new plain or leave them floundering in a muddy ditch? Come and see.



Track Listing:

1. Prelude
2. Hazards of Love 1 (The Prettiest Whistles Won’t Wrestle the Thistles Undone)
3. A Bower Scene
4. Won’t Want for Love (Margaret in the Taiga)
5. Hazards of Love 2 (Wager All)
6. The Queen’s Approach
7. Isn’t it a Lovely Night?
8. The Wanting Comes in Waves / Repaid
9. An Interlude
10. The Rake’s Song
11. The Abduction of Margaret
12. The Queen’s Rebuke / The Crossing
13. Annan Water
14. Margaret in Captivity
15. Hazards of Love 3 (Revenge!)
16. The Wanting Comes in Waves (Reprise)
17. Hazards of Love 4 (The Drowned)

There is a pretty story in the annals of music history. A fan accosts R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck in the street, just after the release of their 1996 album Monster. After the usual formalities are concluded, Buck asks him what his favorite album is. The fan tells Buck that everything he loves about R.E.M. is typified by Murmur, the band’s first full length. Buck nods, but then tells his companion that, by saying that, he has just rendered the last fifteen years of their output redundant. If their first album was the best, what was the point in anything else that they had done? The fan shakes his head, quickly correcting him. It wasn’t that the music had become poorer in the last fifteen years. It was simply different.

And that, by a bizarre sort of circumlocution, is exactly where The Decemberists find themselves with the release this week of The Hazards of Love. They had made their names crafting clever, on occasion achingly moving, character driven narratives, placing their stock in antiquities and folk tradition and drawing upon the influences as diverse as Shirley Collins, Sam Cooke and Morrissey. Each song was a window into the life of its subject. It existed, briefly, fleetingly, almost frailly, and was gone, only to be replaced by another. During the last few years, however, another great influence of the band began to raise its head – prog rock. 2006’s The Crane Wife began to sow the seeds and it is from this point that The Hazards of Love seems to kick off.

It is, you see, an honest to goodness concept album. While the band has experimented with the idea of using collections of songs to tell a longer story in their previous work, they have always confined it to EPs (The Tain), or to a limited number of songs on an LP (The Crane Wife cycle). With The Hazards Of Love, they take the idea to, perhaps, it’s most logical conclusion, dedicating the entire album to one tale. Essentially, it is the story of two lovers, William and Margaret and the things that conspire to keep them apart. Each song exists for the sole purpose of aiding the telling of the tale. There are no asides or tangents and each of the seventeen songs flow into one another, creating, in effect one, 52 minute piece of music.

Truth be told, as a long time fan of the band, I’m not entirely struck on this turn. The problem with any album that attempts to tell a story is that the writing is necessarily confined within the walls of the narrative. Even though I appreciate the interplay between the songs, the repeated themes and the clever wordplay, I miss the sea shanties, the tales from the colonies and the military homoeroticism, none of which have a place in the story of William and Margaret. The great thing about an old school Decemberists album was the sheer variety of characters and settings that it exposed you to. While I never tire of the thrust of The Hazards Of Love’s narrative, which is extremely well constructed, in some ways it limits Meloy’s writing. He is not free in a concept album such as this to play around with themes. There is very little to be found here that is reminiscent of the Victoriana of “The Chimbley Sweep”, the maritime of “A Cautionary Tale” or the modern drama of “On The Bus Mall”. Judging from the direction of the band’s last two LPs, I doubt very much that we will see this sort of writing in a sustained manner ever again, and that really makes me sad.

Having said that, once I have pushed my own subjectivity to one side, I can admit that The Hazards Of Love does a number of things very well and, when all is said and done, is a truly enriching album. It is a testament to Meloy’s narrative prescience that he is able to maintain a consistent and cohesive story for almost an hour, weaving his themes, both lyrical and musical in and out almost at will. The genesis of this album was in musical theater and it really shows at points. The narrative is pushed along not by monologues or postulation from ethereal third people, but in song, in character, by the people wrapped up in the tale. Meloy plays the roles of William and his nemesis, the Rake, who may be the band’s greatest ever antagonist, trumping even the Captain from “The Mariner’s Revenge Song”. To fill out the female roles of Margaret and the Forest Queen, he drafted in friends and colleagues from the Portland music scene. Becky Stark does a good job at emphasizing Margaret’s innocence and naivety – she is a character that happily fills the folk tale pre-requisite – a virtuous, virginal maiden whose world is changed by a force she doesn’t really understand. It is probably fair to say, though, that Shara Worden’s Forest Queen steals the show, channeling the characters jealousy and dominance into a performance that resonates long after the music has stopped, throwing in hints of Patty Smith that fit the hard rocking riffs of the second half perfectly.

I’m sure there will be some people who will be suitably confused by the last line in the previous paragraph. Yip, The Decemberists have, at points on this album, gone heavy. There is a definite hard rock vibe, especially after the introduction of the Forest Queen, that remind me of Black Country metal – Black Sabbath and early Judas Priest. I will quickly point out, for any embittered old folkie who wishes to shout “Judas” that it isn’t all doom and gloom. For the most part, the musical arrangement of the piece reverts to form – 12 string guitars, Hammond organs and the occasional accordion. In fact, “The Rake’s Song”, which is far and away the best individual track on the album and, in my opinion, one of the best lyrics Meloy has ever written, is the closest to a traditional Decemberists song that we are going to get in this day and age. The electric riffs are used comparatively sparingly and, because of this, add something to the mix when they are introduced. Frankly, they serve the purpose of refreshing a sonic palette that would otherwise become stale under 50 odd minutes of acoustics orchestration.

So the songs are rockier, punchier and more thematically consistent than anything The Decemberists have put together before. They are also far denser. There are some albums that instantly permeate the brain, hanging around after one listen as if they have burrowed into the cortex. The Hazards Of Love isn’t one of them. There is a very strong change that, after one listen, you will be left thinking “what the buggering hell was that”. The permutations and subtleties of the thread are not immediately apparent on the first play and I’m sure that many people who are only casually acquainted with the band would be tempted to give up there and then, concluding that the whole thing is the pretentious mumblings of a self-indulgent egotist. That would be an unfair portrait of Meloy and a rash indictment of a soaring body of work. Hazards Of Love is not a one listen wonder. The more you engage with it, the more you understand it. Pieces start to slot into place until finally, four or five plays in, the whole story is laid out like a roadmap in front of you and the full majesty of the vision is revealed. Some people will argue that, by deliberately obfuscating the narrative, the band has ruined what could have been its masterpiece. I’m not inclined to agree. For me, the depth and attention to detail are what sets this apart. That the listener is allowed to discover the subject matter on their own terms is this album’s greatest strength.

The 411: The Hazards Of Love is the first essential Indie release of 2009. While many, myself included, will miss some of the traits of Colin Meloy's early writing, there is no doubt that this is the most technically and thematically accomplished of the band's full length releases. At 52 minutes and with no obvious breaks between tracks, this is not something to dip in and out of but, for those who are willing to persevere, the rewards are great.

Final Score:  8.0   [ Very Good ]