Given that I had to back out of the last two gigs in Houston that I had tickets for (Gomez, and Green Day) because I was sent to Chicago on gig-day, I was super-bummed to learn that my current loves,
The Decemberists, were playing Houston when I was, yet again, in Chicago. But as I was scheduled to be up here for five weeks, I decided I may as well see if there was anyone interesting playing in Chi-Town (correctly pronounced shit-town, Colin Meloy was pleased to inform us) whilst I was here. And joy of joys, I discovered that The Decemberists’ tour was in fact taking them through Chicago on their way from their native Portland to Houston. Huzzah!
So yesterday I bunked off work early (it was still light outside! First time since I’ve been coming here…) and spent a stressful hour and a half driving the 10 miles into Uptown Chicago, to the Riviera Theater. Which turned out to be the perfect venue for The Decemberists - not too large, and with a definitely ’olde worlde’ vibe to it (apart from the irritating “Miller Genuine Draft” projections on the walls…). Kind of reminded me of the New Theater Royal in Portsmouth, mid-renovation.
I don’t know what it is about American gigs and punctuality, but I again managed to miss the support act. The ticket said 7pm; I got there at 7:30, and the roadies were busy setting up for the Decemberists,
Laura Veirs - for it was she, in support - having apparently been and gone. Half an hour of minute adjustments to the remarkably sparse ‘light show’, and
Colin Meloy, sporting the most impressive set of sideburns this side of Noddy Holder, led The Decemberists onto the stage, to the sound of
Prelude, the opening track from their latest album,
The Hazards of Love. This was no mere tease, as the band spent the next hour running through the album in its entireity, from beginning to glorious end.
There’s a bit of a growing trend for bands to play albums in their entireity live (probably as a ploy to encourage people to buy whole-album downloads instead of a couple of key tracks), but in the case of
The Hazards of Love, which is - unfashionably - a ‘concept album’, there was really no other way to do it. And live, it was outstanding. It’s not my favorite album of theirs, but is certainly the one that is best suited to live performance, being significantly rockier than their usual folk-tinged tales. Colin Meloy even revealed his inner (albeit rather stout) rock god, thrashing his way through the album (yes, you can apparently thrash a twelve-string semi-accoustic guitar!).
Anyone who has heard the The Hazards of Love (and if you haven’t, do so now, you phillistine!) will certainly agree that highlight of the album is
My Brightest Diamond’s Shara Worden’s vocal tour de force (apologies for the cliche, but, there’s no other term for it) on
The Wanting Comes In Waves/Repaid. Certainly the entire audience was of this opinion, and seeing that Shara Worden, and the album’s other ‘guest vocalist’,
Lavender Diamond’s Becky Stark (looking like a cross between Stevie Nicks and Anne of Cleeves), had joined the otherwise-5-piece Decemberists for the tour, anticipation was palpably rising as …Repaid drew closer. When it came time for Worden to do her thing, she strode forcefully to the front of the stage, throwing shapes from the Jim James school of dancing, and just ripped into the vocals. Her voice is impressive enough on CD, but on stage is even more powerful, making the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. Worden may have only been drafted into The Decemberists for this album, but for the couple of minutes she was center stage (the rest of the time, playing backing guitar/keybards/drums at the back of the stage) she absoultely owned it. It may as well have been her gig - and she was worth the price of admission alone.
The intro tape, playing before the band took to the stage, was
Pink Floyd’s
Meddle (
Fearless, with it’s terraces chorus of You’ll Never Walk Alone confused the hell out of most of the crowd, who were obviously wondering where all the cheering was coming from, and whether The Decemberists had taken the stage without them noticing). This seemed an odd choice at the time, but made perfect sense once The Decemberists were in full swing; the influence was clear, as The Decemberists took in prog, rock, and all points inbetween. And like the Floyd, The Decemberists can certainly put on a Rock Show (capital R, capital S). Albeit one that incorporates a double-bass, lute, lap steel, glockenspiel, and even a hurdy-gurdy. Mr. Meloy stuck to guitar, but made up for his lack of diversification by swapping guitars every song, which he managed to do without missing a strum, even when he broke a string (much to the consternation of his guitar roadie, who hovered stage-left with a replacement guitar until Colin threatened to catch him with a flying, winkle-pickered foot). The band certainly benefited from being expanded to a seven-piece, most notably on
A Rake’s Tale (Alright!), where five of them took up percussion, pounding away with admirable aplomb.
With the faithful run through The Hazards of Love over, there was a brief intermission before the band came back and ran through a good selection of songs from their prior albums, including
O Valencia!,
The Crane Wife 1 & 2,
July, July,
Los Angeles, I’m Yours, and a few songs I didn’t recognize (so my Decemberists collection obviously isn’t quite as complete as I thought. Must be missing some obscure Japanese import, or something. Dammit.) The high points were certainly every time Colin Meloy shimmered and crooned his way through his most melodic moments, but even the more linear narratives drew strong applause.
Recognizing that taking Shara Worden on tour just to sing a couple of songs during the first half of the gig was a waste of her enormous talent, the band called Worden and Becky Stark back to the stage for a cover of
Heart’s
Crazy On You, with the two women doing their best to out-do each other with the vocal histrionics. And, surprisingly, given that her contribution to Hazards… is a couple of twee vocal spots, Stark more than held her own against Worden, unleashing a power you wouldn’t have thought possible from such a delicate fawn of a girl (although she had changed into a blood-red vamp dress for the number). I’m not much of a Heart fan, but this was certainly a high-point (amongst many high points) of the gig.
And then, after a gentle, Meloy-led accoustic come-down, it was all over - all too soon, at barely 10:15pm (barely the middle of the evening). Overall, a great gig. Maybe not the best ever, but certainly up there in my top 10. But that could be because of my deepening man-crush on Colin Meloy (although I now no longer see him as the pudgy
Morrissey I once did; maybe a more fey Greg Dulli…), and as the band took its final bow, I just wanted to run over and give them all a hug. Apart from Shara Worden. She’s just scary, and would have probably kicked my ass for just looking at her…
(Cross-posted from my blog,
interrobang (!?).)
Colin Meloy
