THE HAZARDS OF LOVE

"The Hazards of Love" is the 5th full-length studio album by us, Portland based progressive folk rock act The Decemberists. The album was released through Capitol/Rough Trade in March 2009.

"The Hazards of Love" is a concept album where all 17 tracks seque into each other and there´s a conceptual story in the lyrics. While most tracks follow an ordinary vers/chorus structure there´s still an undeniable progressive edge to the album. There are re-occuring themes that serves as the glue that binds the album´s concept together in addition to the lyrical concept. In that way "The Hazards of Love" kind of remind me of The "Incident (2009)" by Porcupine Tree.

The music on the album is centered around the memorable song lines and strong vocal performance by lead vocalist/guitarist Colin Meloy. He has quite a few guest vocalists to help him out though and I´m especially fond of some of the female vocal performances on the album. Just take a listen to a song like "The Wanting Comes in Waves / Repaid". That is attitute if I ever heard attitude. I was almost reminded of good old Jenny Haan from Babe Ruth when she was in her prime. The mix of male and female vocals on the album is really a great asset to the music and works well with the story in the lyrics too. The instrumentation is a mix of folky instruments like banjo and accordian and more traditional rock instrumentation like guitar, drums and bass. There´s quite a bit of organ and some synth on the album too. The album features a bit more electric guitar and slightly distorted sections compared to earlier albums by the band and that suits me fine. It brings some good variation to the music. The music is still folk rock though. It´s just a bit more rock oriented than folk based this time. I really think there´s a great flow on the album and the 58:36 pass by in a second. I rarely find albums that I think are perfect in length but "The Hazards of Love" certainly applies.

The musicianship on the album is excellent. Great vocals and great interplay between the musicians. The production is also excellent and suits the music perfectly. All in all "The Hazards of Love" is a really great and interesting album by The Decemberists and a 4 star (80%) rating is deserved.