Two Fifths

SteveK’s take on releases number 5 from Blue October and The Decemberists

Blue October: Approaching Normal

Blue October’s shot to superstardom three years ago with the release of their fourth album, ‘Foiled’. The single “Hate Me” shot up the charts and its angst-ridden, confessional themes.

Blue Oc

tober amp it up on ‘Approaching Normal’, taking their already powerfully intense music and infusing it with nervous breakdown-level anxiety and anguish. As much as I enjoyed Blue October’s previous releases I was actually taken aback when I listened to ‘Approaching Normal’.

You can practically hear the spittle flying from Justin Furstenfeld’s mouth as he sings on the lead track, “Weight of the World”. The rest of the album is equally passionate, unbridled and disconcerting.

While ‘Approaching Normal’ is not my cup of tea, and hardly my favourite Blue October release, this one is sure to please their more loyal fans.

Blue October: Approaching Normal
Universal
Steve’s Rating: 7/10

The Decemberists: The Hazards of Love

Singer-songwriter indie rock artists The Decemberists have just released what I consider to be, thus far, the best album of 2009. ‘The Hazards of Love’, a collection of loosely interwoven story-songs about love in its numerous and varying forms. The album is rich, complex, with elaborate and recurring melodies, ballads, duets and intelligent, emotive lyrics and vocals.

This

album is one that I can only talk about as a whole work; taking any one song apart from the others would be like trying to judge an entire book on the merits of a single chapter. This is a high-concept album, one that must be listened to from beginning to end in order to be fully appreciated. Having said all that, I have to admit to being a big fan of “The Rake’s Song”, a delightfully grim and gruesome story of a psychotic widower’s child-rearing solutions.

Fans of the Decemberists and their Celtic-inspired Folk-Rock will be delighted with this one, and I expect that even listeners with only a casual acquaintance with the Decemberists or their musical genre will enjoy ‘Hazards of Love’.

Simply put, this is unquestionably the best album I’ve heard, this year.

The Decemberists: Hazards of Love
Capitol
Steve’s Rating: 10/10