![]() Still, these flamboyant attempts are something to behold and at least occasionally admire. There’s also child murder, a jealous queen, and enough anachronism to power an autogyroor gramophone for weeks. The latter he’s got covered: Hazards tells the story of a woman, Margaret, whose travails include being sexually assaulted by a shape-shifter, abduction at the hands of a villain known as “the rake,” and eventually (if conceptalbums require spoiler alerts, consider this fair warning) joyous death in the arms of her true love. Heavy on atmosphere and narrative, the hour-long, 17-part opus sets itself up as a piece of musical theater but forgets too frequently that great musicals need to deliver sticky choruses in addition to plot-advancing details.Īlso Read Global Music Release Day Switches to Fridays on July 10 Yet with The Hazards of Love, Meloy may have high-kicked too far. (Maybe you can’t directly empathize with, say, a “chimbley sweep,” but you can at least appreciate his plight in song.) So why did often reticent indie-rock fansindulge this Portland, oregon orchestralpop group’s move toward proggish pomposity, a path normally reserved for bands associated with cheesy ’70s excess (Styx, Yes, REO Speedwagon)? Because Meloy can write the hell out of a melody, and he’s got a flair for making what might seem heady and ridiculous on paper into something that sounds relatable and touching. Jumping to a major label further fueled Meloy’s desire for outsize ideas: 2006’s The Crane Wife both summarized his past work and then added a multipart song cycle based on a Japanese folk tale for good measure. Smarty-pants fans swooned for his use of old-timey language on 2002’s Castaways and Cutouts, embraced the nautical theme of the following year’s Her Majesty, and gleefully joined (or, more likely, rejoined) the drama club on indie farewell Picaresque. ![]() ![]() Colin Meloy’s grandiose ambitions have, along with his band’s popularity, grown gradually more grandiose over the years. ![]()
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