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.

“(We're Not) The Jet Set”

George Jones and Tammy Wynette were still married when they recorded the tongue-in-cheek "(We're Not) The Jet Set." The lyrics, written by Nashville songwriter Bobby Braddock, who also penned Wynette's "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" and Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today," make fun of the good life by declaring, "We're not the Jet Set/We're the old Chevrolet set." Braddock recalled that while writing the song, he needed the name of a city that evened out the rhyme he had with "Riviera" and "Missourah." “I got out a Rand McNally atlas," he said. "In the first part are the maps. The last part is an alphabetical listing of cities. I wanted a rustic, small-time sound. I went to the listing for Missouri. And I found 'Festus.' I loved the sound of it."