The Decemberists smashed onto the national scene a few years ago from their secluded perch in Portland Oregon, home of Bogart’s Place and several nice sized wholesale outlets for restaurant supplies. Colin Meloy is the defacto leader and songwriter and resident genius. I have two of their CDs, the majestic Crane Wife and the even better Picaresque . Their music is a throw-back to the old folk storytelling genre whereby songs passed down through generations become a oral history that would be otherwise lost. I’ve been looking for music that was new, innovative – different and the Decemberists represented that deeper longing in me for good music not particularly or overtly commercial yet accessible (to someone like me).

Indie Folk rock Morrissey-wannabees The Decemberists took East Lansing like a storm in a teacup on the sprawling campus of MSU on Wednesday November 12th. Not that the largely college-age crowd didn’t love their indie heroes, they seemed truly appreciative of the Decemberists in a very quiet way…toward the end of the show a few people even stood up to dance and the crowd, enmasse, did a stand-up and sway to a two-song encore. I can’t figure it out. I was looking forward to listening to Colin Meloy and his band pound out some of the most unusual story-songs based on 17th century lore and Shakespearean middle English since, well Shakespeare…or a modern wordsmith such as Bob Dylan. Dylan may be the organic link between the ancient folk songs of Woody Guthrie and the Decemberist’s growing canon of 12 minute masterworks. As soon as Dylan hit that Bb chord on ISIS , an incredibly longish opus that linked the ancient mother-goddess to a 19th century chanteuse in a tale of love loss and betrayal, the folk-rock muse whispered in Meloy’s ear and said “it is good”.
But somehow the band just didn’t connect with the crowd… was it Meloy’s curious faux British/Irish singing voice (though at times he sounded like Michael Stipe on Losing My Religion) or Meloy not knowing the difference between MSU and U of M. Nah…they’re both high-priced bourgeois instituitions that attempt to educate middle class rogues and taking a good-natured poke at a silly rivalry is good sport indeed. Still…- I mean, these cats are NOT rock stars -they are the plain everyman who gives voice to our deepest mythology, our collective unconscious – we should LOVE them. But it’s hard when the audience and the artist just don’t seem to care - as if we were a married couple with a 7-year itch. How do we reignite the spark?

The concert itself was low-key yet masterful even with a minimalist approach to instrumentation…guitars, stand-up and electric bass, drums, keyboards and accordion. For my money the accordion/keyboard player Jenny Conlee was the glue that held the band together and was responsible, in a large part, for the richness of the Decemberists’ sound. The band was savvy enough to use silence and spaces in-between the instrumentation to punctuate the dramatic effect of the storytelling. And the songs…wonderfully written and executed. They are no less than modern folk masterpieces …marches, waltzes, straight folk, rock and shuffles. The Decemberists gave us a taste of their incredible versatility. They performed some of their most notable compositions – the summer means fun (sometimes) dittie July July and the funky deep bottom anti-war anthem 16 Military Wives, and their recent single Valerie Plame (about the outed CIA operative - thank you Robert Novak) with a McCartney-esque coda ala Hey Jude. …very cool. Some of Meloy’s stories have quite wicked or dour themes like the song Leslie Anne Lavigne – the name of the girl who died “with me” 15 years ago in 1842. Meloy even eschewed story for introspection in Before the Fall a minor chord jewel ; then he shifts dramatically to the almost savage rocker A Perfect Crime . And in a Perfect Crime II the Decemberists rock like the Panther Burns teaching the gospel to Alex Chilton so he can introduce punk to Memphis. Oh Valencia is wondrous seventies style rocker with old fashioned hand claps and a riff straight out of the Cars catalog. At the end of the evening I was spent, maybe it was the energy-sapping hyper-focus on my new favorite band or maybe I just wanted to watch them fresh young coeds in their tight blue jeans. Bending, arching and movin’ it for their clueless young turk boyfriends – the future leaders of the free world.

But As I hunkered down in my seat and gazed at the beauty all around me, I thought I heard the chords to Shambala…was that Three Dog Night doing an encore?

Peace
Bo White