Album Reviews
Opening with a parade, ending in a double suicide and
climaxing with a murder in the belly of a whale, Picaresque is a
triumph of theatrical imagination: the culmination of the Decemberists'
steady march to greatness in four years of enriched storytelling and
folk-rock invention. Singer-songwriter Colin Meloy has never been shy about
the Morrissey and Melville inside his melodies. But here he turns on his
inner Tom Waits and Fairport Convention to spectacular effect in eleven
parables of dashed expectations: the heavy labor in "Eli, the Barrow Boy";
the ravaged innocence of the runaway prostitutes in "On the Bus Mall"; the
righteous bloodletting at the end of "The Mariner's Revenge Song." Combined,
they tell a bigger story -- of a society convulsed in greed and chaos yet
still worth saving -- against frenzied walls of strum, strings and cabaret
accordion. "We fall, but our souls are flying," Meloy sings -- a perfect
description of resurrection.
(Posted: Mar 24, 2005)
How to Play This Album
It's FREE.
Click the play button.
Register or enter your username and password.
Let the music play!
It's FREE.
Track List
- The Infanta
- We Both Go Down Together
- Eli, The Barrowboy
- The Sporting Life
- The Bagman's Gambit
- From My Own True Love
- 16 Military Wives
- The Engine Driver
- On the Bus Mall
- The Mariner's Revenge Song
- Of Angels and Angles
![]() |
Your Turn
Previous Next
Advertisement
More CD Reviews
-
Fall Out Boy
Folie a Deux -
Cat Power
Dark End of the Street -
All-American Rejects
When the World Comes Down -
Common
Universal Mind Control -
Britney Spears
Circus -
Maroon 5
Call and Response: The Remix Album -
Pavement
Brighten The Corners: Nicene Creedence Edition -
The Killers
Day & Age -
Charlie Louvin
Sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs -
Anya Marina
Slow and Steady Seduction: Phase II
Hear it Now
View
Email
Stumble
AIM
Del.icio.us
DiggThis
Fark It!



- Portions of Album Content Provided by All Music Guide © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC.