Rob Mason Tells You What To Listen To: The Long Winters Monday, Dec 7 2009
the arts 2:23 am
Hello! It is time for another edition of Rob Mason Tells You What To Listen To! In this edition we will explore The Long Winters’ discography. They are making a new album so now is the time to catch up on all their stuff and pretend you know all about the Seattle music scene!
The Long Winters are pretty appropriately named. There are songs about the first sign of winter and songs about waiting all winter and songs about springtime. It always feels like there is a long winter involved, is what I’m saying. Fronted by endearingly crazed mountain man John Roderick, the lyrics are frequently clever, often whimsical, and always pretty. There are five tracks to be downloaded and loved right here.
The Worst You Can Do Is Harm
Their first album is called The Worst You Can Do Is Harm. If you click the clicky you will see it is described it as being “full of ghosts and shipwrecked relationships.” It is an album about being well-meaning, about having a place to call home, about running away, and about making mistakes. It is not very optimistic: it’s a record full of disasters, and sometimes you can’t pick up the pieces.
There are some gems on this album. I really enjoy “Carparts,” “Unsalted Butter,” and “Scent of Lime”–the last of which features some beautiful harmony vocals from Sean Nelson. There is not a track I don’t enjoy, though the opener, “Give Me A Moment,” can drag some. Yet this is probably the weakest Long Winters album. It feels uncertain. There is a definite sound but it’s not quite sure where it’s going. It’s like the first few weeks of winter, when it’s warm one day and snowing the next and you’re just not sure what to make of it.
I remember reading an interview with John Roderick (I do not remember where, but it was really good) about the meaning of the title. It’s kind of an answer to the question “Well, what’s the worst that could happen?”–the worst that could happen is you could seriously ruin something forever. The title appears in the song “Scent of Lime:” “The worst you can do is harm / Waiting for the other shoe to fall / And shouting from your car at an empty road.”
There’s lots of little moments like that on the album, but mostly it’s rough. It’s worth having, but check out the others first, unless you really like listening in chronological order. This is definitely a debut album.
When I Pretend To Fall
When I Pretend To Fall is definitely the most upbeat of the three albums, and undeniably fun. This is an album which has at its emotional core the idea of spring coming at the end of a long winter, and an album which has probably the best description of anything that I have read, anywhere. No, seriously:
This is our new record. It’s made of downtown right as the sun comes out after it’s been raining and a little bit of three a.m. city bus in from the airport. There are several big fights between people who love each other that end with both people breaking into song and someone in a tee-shirt with rolled-up sleeves playing a sax solo. Also, there are friends coming to the rescue and there are other friends who don’t want to be rescued and there are a few friends that do want to be rescued but don’t want to have to ask.
I can’t do better than that.
The heart of this album is “Cinnamon,” which is a really beautiful and happy song. It’s just so hopeful, and it is made all the more poignant by being followed by “Bride and Bridle,” a song that is about how sometimes time isn’t long enough to put the past behind you. And then later on there’s “It’ll Be A Breeze” which is about absence. Then there’s an important moment in the song “Stupid,” where the title is sung: “She laughs when I pretend to fall.” It’s about doing stupid things for love, but in a hopeful way, which certainly captures the soul of this album pretty nicely.
It closes on a slightly darker note with “Nora,” which tells a story of different expectations coming into conflict. It’s a perfect note for closing the album, to make it all seem a little uneasy in retrospect, the way a conclusion ought to do.
This album is really good. If you like your music upbeat and irrepressibly cheerful without being credulous, this is a perfect album. If you like albums that feel like seeing green grass finally growing through the snow, you should probably order it as soon as possible.
Putting the Days to Bed
Putting the Days to Bed is the newest album and it is also the sleepiest. Appropriately so! This is an album which is about trying to come to terms with regret. Some things weren’t meant to last; some things were meant to last but don’t; some things weren’t meant to last no matter how much you think they were. It’s not entirely depressing but it is certainly resigned, but wistful. Perhaps nostalgic is the best word.
So to keep with this wintry theme, this is an album that takes place in the dead of winter–as the song “Fire Island, AK” says, “the ice has come”–and you know it’s going to be months before spring. This doesn’t mean you can’t warm yourself by the fire and think of the happier times or wish really hard for warmer times and poetic autumns. There are two songs I consider the emotional core of this album: “Hindsight,” which is a song about the end of something beautiful, and “Ultimatum,” which is a song about wishing that it didn’t have to end this way and doing what you have to do. And it closes on a strong note with “Seven,” which seems to accept the departure, though not without a strong sense of regret.
The title is a line from “Hindsight:” “Did you say what you wanted said / Or are you just putting the days to bed?” and captures the feel of the album nicely: it is an album about leaving things unsaid, about just putting it all behind you without getting the chance to actually do anything about it. (Of course, since when does saying everything you wanted to say actually make anything better?)
This is my personal favorite album, because nostalgia and regret are emotions I find particularly powerful, but it is a quiet album with a lot of acoustic guitar, perfect for putting the days to bed, and for those nights when you wish things had ended differently. Or if you just want to listen to an album with the line “If you’re my anchor, then I’m throwing you over the side.” It has that line in it. But you probably shouldn’t expect something upbeat.