Listen: New Decemberists Album 'The King is Dead'

Click to listen to The Decemberists "The King Is Dead"

The Decemberists have set aside the sprawling multi-part epics they're known for in favor of concise pop tunes and guest appearances from Gillian Welch and R.E.M.'s Peter Buck on their sixth album The King is Dead (out January 18; pre-order on iTunes now). Rolling Stone's Will Hermes gave the record four stars, praising singer/songwriter Colin Meloy for his ornate lyrics and sumptuous harmonies and noting that his "songs savor straightforward pleasures." Click above to hear it for yourself in this audio stream of the album in its entirety.

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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