Decemberists show us some ‘Love’
The Decemberists’ newest album, “The Hazards of Love,” begins with almost a minute of near-complete silence. Slowly, an electrically charged hum swells in the background, a wavering organ shrieks a few eerie notes and a ghostly choir wails. The stage is set.
Over the next 16 tracks, the band (led by nasal-voiced frontman Colin Meloy) will stage a complex, operatic spectacle. Drawing on their trademark hyperliterate lyrics, obscure folk references and intricately layered instrumentation, with “Hazards” the Decemberists finally achieve the concept album promised by 2004’s “The Tain...
