As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again by The Decemberists

At #21 we find a band I thought we’d never see on the Top 31 again. What’s even more surprising is that there’s at least 3 other bands coming up in the 2024 Top 31 that I would have lost money betting on them never making another appearance. So, I believe kudos are in order for The Decemberists, that merry band of minstrels hailing from Portland, Oregon, for truly surprising longevity, and for producing a truly great album in As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again.

It’s been six years since we last heard from the quintet (I’ll Be Your Girl, #15 in 2018), and it’s the fifth time the band has appeared in the Top 31 (rounding out the five are #18 in 2015, #3 in 2011 and #2 in the inaugural 2009 list). I’m confident had I been making my list since the turn of the century, all four of the band’s even earlier albums would have made an appearance. 22 years, The Decemberists have been making music. And it’s safe to say I’ve been a fan for the entire journey.

I must be suffering from some strong recency bias, as As It Ever Was ranks not only as a great record, it ranks as a great Decemberists record, much better than any of the past, oh, 3 albums. And yet here I am, placing it further down the list than any previous Decemberists album has appeared. Be that as it may, I’m going to stick with the narrative that this new album is a real return to form for the band. I suppose I should have expected that, given the title blatantly saying as such.

All the usual melancholy themes are here: death, darkness, and dread, sung with the same chipper trill I’ve loved for two decades from lead singer/songwriter Colin Meloy. Chris Funk (guitars), Jenny Conlee-Drizos (keyboards, and, more importantly, accordion), Nate Query (bass), and John Moen (drums), have all returned, happily writing and performing complex baroque-pop prog rock music accompaniment.

The band has traditionally produced some great videos to pair with their highly visual songs, but not this time around. The video above is a live version of “Oh No!” produced by the band, and a great Squirrel Nut Zippers-esque song. You can watch the band’s KEXP Live performance to hear a handful of other songs from the album, all great. But if you want to hear my favorite song from the album, you’ll have to tune into an “Official Audio” version from YouTube.

That song is “Joan in the Garden,” and it is a 19 minute, 21 second masterpiece. It has all of Meloy’s favorite words in it, like “firmament,” “mariner,” and “parquet.” It sounds a bit like a lost track from Pink Floyd’s The Wall. And it is wonderful. The Decemberists have excelled at the exceedingly long epic. There first was “California One / Youth and Beauty Brigade,” from their debut album, clocking in at 9 minutes, 50 seconds. Their EP, The Tain, from 2004, a telling of the Irish mythological story Táin Bó Cúailnge, covers the span of 18 minutes, 35 seconds of prog rock bliss. “The Island, Come And See, The Landlord’s Daughter, You’ll Not Feel The Drowning,” (yes, that’s the title of a single song), from 2006’s The Crane Wife, is 12 minutes, 26 seconds long. And that album also has its title song, broken up and switched around across parts “3” and “1 And 2” at 4:18 and 11:24, respectively (15 minutes, 42 seconds total). The Hazards of Love had “The Hazards of Love” parts 1-4 (“The Prettiest Whistles Won’t Wrestle The Thistles Undone,” “Wager All,” “Revenge!,” and “The Drowned”), but in reality the entire album is a single story, clocking in at 58:37. “Joan in the Garden,” from the year of our lord 2024, is better than all of them.

How a band of misfit theater nerds has ever achieved the longevity and accolades that The Decemberists have is beyond comprehension. Colin Meloy is a master storyteller, and the musicians who have long made up the band are masterful in their craft. While I never expected to get another great album from them, As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again was a very pleasant surprise, and well worth the wait.

__________________________________________

Subscribe to the Top 31 playlists!

Full Albums
All albums in their entirety

Radio Station
The best song pulled from each album

View all previous years’ Top 31s

Ants From Up There by Black Country, New Road

My guess is that this may be the last surprise of the 2022 Top 31. Sure, you might be surprised by the order in which I place my Top 10, or you might be surprised to find your particular favorite wasn’t one of mine. But I would be surprised if you don’t read the Top 10 as they’re revealed over the next ten days, nod your head at each one, and think “yep, ok, I can see that.”

Not so for Black Country, New Road, here at #11, which you’ve likely not ever heard of, despite some modest level of critical acclaim. And if you have heard of them, then you no doubt know why I’m placing them way up in my top albums of 2022. Known as BC,NR because, well, it’s a lot easier to write and it’s also awesome to have a comma in an abbreviation, the band met in Cambridgeshire, England, in 2018. They named themselves after the subject found at a click of the “random article” button in Wikipedia: Black Country New Road, a street in the West Midlands. Ants From Up There is their second album, recorded with seven members: Tyler Hyde (bass), Lewis Evans (flute, saxophone), May Kershaw (keyboards), Georgia Ellery (violin), Charlie Wayne (drums), Luke Mark (guitar), all of whom played their instruments deftly while singing backup to frontman, guitarist, and principal lyricist Isaac Wood.

Wood’s voice is low, with a vibrato that makes your subs shake — not quite as low as Ian Curtis, not quite as smooth as Justin Vernon, but every bit engaging. His lyrics have a literary lilt to them that don’t quite paint a story, but lead you to the next word, verse, and chorus as if compelled by tendrils of sound. And much to everyone detriment, there will be no more BC,NR albums with Wood at the helm. Four days before the release of Ants, Wood and the band announced on Instagram that he would be stepping away from the band, from the limelight, permanently. His mental health had been suffering greatly, and he needed to take care of himself.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Black Country, New Road (@blackcountrynewroad)

I first heard the album probably a week or so after it debuted on February 4, 2022. It filled me with such excitement, when I first started trying to learn more about the band I was devastated to find the post above and learn I’d never be able to experience the excitement Wood brings to the stage. I listened more and more to Ants over the coming months, and hit a point where I couldn’t put the album down. Pulling from the same influences as Beirut, Neutral Milk Hotel, the Decemberists, Slint, Noah and the Whale, BC,NR bring together heavy orchestration, ivy league intelligence, and prog-rock turns that leave you breathless. This is the album you need to fill the Arcade Fire-sized void left behind because of Win Butler’s sexual misconduct.

You’ll recognize violinist Georgia Ellery’s name, as she is one-half of Jockstrap, featured at #21 just 11 days ago. I’m pretty sure that’s the first time an artist has been an integral part of two separate bands featured on a single Top 31. When Wood announced his departure on January 31, the band had to cancel their upcoming tour and weren’t sure where this would lead them. A few months later, they had picked themselves back up and were touring again, now as a six-piece, with Hyde, Kershaw, Evans, and Wayne taking turns on lead vocals. I have not been able to see this incarnation of the band, but the strength of these songs and these musicians makes me believe it’s still every bit as strong.

Ants came out a year after those original seven band members released their debut, For The First Time, in February, 2021. I missed their debut, and based on how much I love Ants, a fairly sizable oversight on my part. I’m curious to see where the band will go next. I enjoy the Wood incarnation of the band, and am patiently waiting to see what the band will put together next. “Concord,” shown in the video above, is probably my favorite song on the album. But if you like it, I encourage you to explore the rest of the album.

There are many ways to listen to the 2022 Bacon Top 31. Subscribe now and enjoy the new albums / songs as they are revealed on the countdown!

Full Album
All albums in their entirety.

Radio Station
A single song selection pulled from each album.

View all previous Bacon Top 31s

#21 on the 2024 Bacon Top 31 — The Decemberists

#11 on the 2022 Bacon Top 31 — Black Country, New Road