THE CRANE WIFE

after disappointing "the king is dead" i think this is a time to review a album that gives us a very proggy hope... the crane wife is a concept album that based on a famous traditional japanese story revolves around...well...a crane wife!!! but forget the story what is matter here is what decemberists are capable of anyone who listen the earlier albums of the band can see their admiration towards folks 70's english prog. acts. and while giving us impressive tien ep they never fully show their proggy side on a full lp until this one... the album opens with "the crane wife 3" a wonderful showcase of what decemberists being doing for past four years. but the real suprise come after this one a majestic 12 minute tour de force "the island" wich gives us all the pivotal elements of british prog.,indie sensibilities and folkish leanings. the song starts off in a the crane wife vein but near the middle takes a rough turn and jenny conlee's organ attack suddenly hits us while our guards down and the song concludes with heart breaking all acoustic you'll not feel the drowning... with yankee bayonet we go back to the classic indie folk stylings and than o valencia! cames as another example of that kind of approach and succeeds in every way fast and entertaining tune welcomes you and with that you are connected to "the perfect crime 2" a song a bit more jazzier feeling with groovy guitars and steady bass-line an impressive piece of music. after that we hear "when the war came" wich i think closer to this new kind of guitar rock with repeating hard guitar riff and simple rhythm section executed very fine and enjoyable enough after this hard riffed piece we hear shankill butchers another classic decemberists with accordion one of the weaker songs in the album i think. after the "slow as a death" shankill butchers the summersong opens with joyful sound and wonderfully used accordion this is probably the best folkish number on the album worksat every level music, vocal... everything. after the summersong comes the second epic track the crane wife 1,2 and again(like island) gives us that feeling that we longed for long year the song opens with meloy's voice and classic guitar and slowly builds up with organ and cello and than breaks loose while meloy shouting "my crane wife" again jenny conlee's organ work is spectacular and adds a fresh air to the lineer sounding music... the second part of the song is more acoustic for a while meloy goes solo with his classic guitar but towards the end song finds more insturments and have a joyful but sad tone and this connect us to sons and daughters a hopeful song with accordions and classic guitar slowly builds up with multipile vocals and growing tempo slowly fading away with all the bombs... so the crane wife is an important work for decemberists and for a major record company debut a bold one too... in 2000's music market it is hard to play big with 12 munite epic songs and decemberists tries that and deserves credit even just for that a solid listen for almost any proghead and deserves 4 stars...