Portland, Oregon, residents are currently celebrating Decemberists Day in honor of the band and their new release, What a Terrible World, What a Wonderful World. Mayor Charlie Hales dedicated today (Jan. 20) to The Decemberists and praised them for making their hometown proud. The band also performed at the proclamation ceremony today, Consequence of Sound reports.
Hales wrote a nice letter on the group's behalf.
Portland Oregon is widely regarded as a community in which the myths and legends of our past intermingle with the peculiarities of the current citizenry; and it is from the city of Portland that arose the indie-rock ensemble known by its moniker from a quasi-obscure moment in Russian history, the Decemberists.
How's that for building up some excitement? If Hales ever loses the mayoral chair, he has a future as a hypeman for the band, no doubt.
The songwriting of Colin Meloy returns to our minds genres such as the troubadour's ballad, the lonely sailor's sea chantey, the bitter soldier's lamant, and other song forms from a halfway-imagined history.
Hales then praised Chris Funk, Jenny Conlee, Nate Query and John Moen for their contributions, which "make every Decemberist song a mingling of hope, perseverance, and other stalwart emotions associated with indie rock."
The band already shared "The Wrong Year" and "Make You Better" from their seventh studio album. Pitchfork rated the effort a 5.6.
"But the failure of this album, in addition to being overlong and under-ambitious, is the idea that maturity should beget lazy, hammock songs," the publication wrote. "Some songs were written as long as four years ago, just after The King Is Dead. There's pleasure in feeling time pass on the album, but it passes so slowly, and at some points, interminably. The pro forma folk-rock of the entire thing is a slog."
