Well I'm the one who added them, so I may be the biggest fool 

Admittedly their first couple of albums are more like artsy pop-folk with very mild prog influences, particularly on keyboards, and there are valid comparisons to be made to bands like R.E.M. and Let's Active, along with groups like the Baghdaddies and plenty of modern klezmer music on the folksy side.  And there are other bands like Rev. Glasseye and the Handsome Family who pen similar campy and morbidly dark character sketches.  So the various pieces are nothing new individually.  And I will say there was reluctance by some collaborators to add them.

But IMHO 'The Crane Wife' and, more significantly, 'The Tain' and 'The Hazards of Love' have proven Colin Meloy and Company are also serious fans of both folk and prog rock.  At the same time they know how to entertain, and with the last two albums have managed to do so without compromising their music despite being signed by a major label.  Sure, they appeared on Letterman, the Colbert Report, NPR and the like, but who cares really - I grew up in a time when bands could be both popular and progressive, so I don't see a problem there.  

The Decemberists aren't Yes or ELP, but they don't pretend to be either, and those TV appearances don't do justice to their live concerts.  Check out their current tour if you can, or look for clips on youTube at least, and check out their DVD 'A Practical Handbook'.  There's more than a little Peter Gabriel mixed in with the  Michael Stipe and Freddy Mercury showmanship on that thing.

Prog Folk is about as accurate a label as 'world music' when it comes to describing the bands who are listed under that tagon this site.  Most if not all the bands under the Prog Folk heading have three things in common:

- plenty of acoustic and ethnic instrumentation;
- a strong emphasis on lyrics, mostly in the form of story-telling; and
- clear cultural contexts, often based on regional history, mythology, religion or ethnic themes.

We used to have a definition of prog rock on this site that included the description "ambitious, eclectic, and often grandiose style of rock music" (not sure if that's still written anywhere here - I think it may have been changed when Art Rock morphed into Crossover.  Anyway, that fits the Decemberists IMHO, so that's good enough for me 

~Rael~ wrote: Though, according to your criteria, couldn't Fleet Foxes be in the prog-folk category, or at least heading in that direction?

Only thing I know of them is from TV, SNL I think.  They were pretty decent if I remember; might be headed in the right direction.  

Maybe if they put out an 18-minute interpretation of an Irish folktale or an album with a little vibraphone or glockenspiel or pedal steel or strings; and maybe a song or two about amateur hookers on merchant ships or ghosts of dead babies or something like that it might push them over the edge 

Synchestra wrote: I'm a little suprised to see them listed as prog folk too. Crossover or something like that maybe, as some of their songs are proggy (the island, and title track(s) from the crane wife, for example), but for the most part they seem a sort of folk-pop-rock band. but regardless, i love them prog or not

Here's another viewpoint I suppose:

http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/album/26771574/review/26800865/hazards_of_love - Rolling Stone called the Decemberists 'prog' and 'folk'

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/2633942/paste_reviews_the_decemberists_the_hazards_of_love/ - Paste called them prog and folk (also called them the 'Dorks of Hazard', but that's okay )

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/2633942/paste_reviews_the_decemberists_the_hazards_of_love/ - Pitchfork called them prog-folk

http://www.2-4-7-music.com/album-review.asp?ID=2720 - Crud called them prog and folk

http://www.slantmagazine.com/music/music_review.asp?ID=1689 - Slant called them prog (but not folk since no one at Slant knows what folk music is)

http://www.qromag.com/reviews/album_reviews/the_decemberists_:_the_hazards_of_love/ - QRO called them prog and folk

http://treblezine.com/reviews/3043-The_Decemberists_The_Hazards_of_Love.html - Treble called the prog folk

http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/71979-the-decemberists-the-hazards-of-love/ - Pop Matters calls them folk and prog "geeky" rock

http://www.seemagazine.com/article/music/cd-reviews/listen0326/ - SEE called them prog-folk

http://music.barnesandnoble.com/The-Hazards-of-Love/The-Decemberists/e/5099921471025 - Barnes and Noble calls them prog and folk

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/discography/index.jsp?pid=484428&aid=1213103 - Billboard calls them prog folk

http://www.thankscaptainobvious.net/2009/04/decemberists-hazards-of-love-2009.html - Captain Obvious calls them prog and folk (thanks Captain Obvious!)

So if you were some relatively clueless but well-meaning young lad (or lass) and were trolling around the big scary and confusing internet looking for some folks who knew a bit about prog and folk music and maybe had some good advice on which Decemberists albums were the best, and possibly even some other bands that might be considered in that same general category; where would you more than likely end up?

This place is called a prog Archive after all, not a 'prog club', and the primary reason it exists is to provide people with a comprehensive reference source for prog music.  That, of necessity, means including quite a bit of music that isn't going to appeal to some (or even most) of us who frequent the site.

I spend a lot of time at the library too, even though I only check out a very, very small percentage of the books housed there.  

I don't know. I started listening to them because "The Hazards of Love" was edited in Argentina. They aren't bad , but there was so much hype about them that I thought they would be the greatest thing since sliced bread.