I haven't given a shit about OR since The Stage Names. What is that, nine years ago? To this day, Black Sheep Boy is the only front-to-back great album in my book. And if I'm honest, from The Stage Names, only "Savannah Smiles" is the song that floors me to this day - that song is really an all-time "sad-bastard" classic.
I remember making copy CDs of BSB for all my friends - easily an album that translated across most of my friend-base, even among the "12-CD-a-year-club" friends that we all share. Given all that, I'm kind of surprised how little I care about a new release from this band. Their last couple have left me so cold. But I guess I still have some hope...
― Rod Steel (musicfanatic), Tuesday, 6 September 2016 03:08 (seven years ago) link
give it a shot, my experience is basically parallel to yours
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Tuesday, 6 September 2016 03:13 (seven years ago) link
Soooooo yeah I think this might be the best thing Sheff's done so far.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Wednesday, 7 September 2016 09:20 (seven years ago) link
I think this is the best Okkervil album.
― akm, Thursday, 8 September 2016 12:23 (seven years ago) link
(i'm going to listen to the new one soon)
"black sheep boy #4" -- wow, still so moving after all these years
― have you ever even read The Drudge Report? Have you gone on Stormfron (k3vin k.), Saturday, 10 September 2016 05:37 (seven years ago) link
i can't stop listening to this album
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Saturday, 10 September 2016 16:01 (seven years ago) link
this is not as much of a departure sonically as people were making it sound but it feels fresh regardless
― ciderpress, Saturday, 10 September 2016 17:10 (seven years ago) link
I'm starting to think the album would be a little better off, pacing-wise, without "She Would Look For Me" but otherwise I'm still enamored. Reviews have been surprisingly middling for the most part? They all have the feel of folks who listened to it maybe twice.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Saturday, 10 September 2016 18:33 (seven years ago) link
I'm in love with "Mary On a Wave," love that almost-groove.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Saturday, 10 September 2016 18:37 (seven years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnXEtu6nwFY
did we know that scott walker covered "black sheep boy"??
― have you ever even read The Drudge Report? Have you gone on Stormfron (k3vin k.), Saturday, 10 September 2016 20:07 (seven years ago) link
yeah! everyone loves tim hardin
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Saturday, 10 September 2016 20:09 (seven years ago) link
oh duh i forgot the song "BSB" was a tim hardin cover
― have you ever even read The Drudge Report? Have you gone on Stormfron (k3vin k.), Saturday, 10 September 2016 20:09 (seven years ago) link
not really feeling this on first listen :( will definitely try again
― have you ever even read The Drudge Report? Have you gone on Stormfron (k3vin k.), Sunday, 11 September 2016 19:12 (seven years ago) link
It took me a few listens. Hell, it took me 5 or 6 to make sense of "Call Yourself Renee" as the second track.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Sunday, 11 September 2016 20:22 (seven years ago) link
yeah it took more listens than usual but i adore this album now
― ciderpress, Sunday, 11 September 2016 22:59 (seven years ago) link
it's a bit of a trojan horse where the previous albums were all very up-front about going straight at your emotions
― ciderpress, Sunday, 11 September 2016 23:10 (seven years ago) link
I'm in love with "Mary On a Wave," love that almost-groove.― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Saturday, September 10, 2016 2:37 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Saturday, September 10, 2016 2:37 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― ciderpress, Monday, 12 September 2016 02:36 (seven years ago) link
Ever the contrarian, I found myself thinking this might be their best album one the first run through and now, having listened again to BSB (although the appendix nudges it to a very high level admittedly) I am convinced it is. I can't understand how anyone could rate this as a seven out of ten album.
― yugi ex, Monday, 12 September 2016 06:59 (seven years ago) link
I like this album fine but the idea that it's better than BSB or The Stage Names is indeed contrarian.
― heaven parker (anagram), Monday, 12 September 2016 07:56 (seven years ago) link
not sure about BSB yet but I'll take this one over any other Okkervil record
― ciderpress, Monday, 12 September 2016 11:25 (seven years ago) link
Maybe it's the fact that it reminds me (in places) of prime American Music Club but I definitely prefer it to TSN.
― yugi ex, Tuesday, 13 September 2016 10:57 (seven years ago) link
Yeah, lyrically, this one is actually reminding me a lot of late-period AMC and recent solo Eitzel, where he crams in as many words as possible in a song and tells a story (ie: Patriot's Heart, Windows on the World).
― akm, Tuesday, 13 September 2016 13:53 (seven years ago) link
I really like this album... maybe I should be listening to AMC! never tried getting into them tbh
OR releases since The Stage Names felt like a series of dead ends, an ever-improving band let down by some directionless songwriting (the Golden Opportunities series really stands head & shoulders above those records; I'm sure the live shows were great, too) & so it's nice to hear nine tracks' worth of memorable melodies & interesting lyrics again -- the looser, pared-back arrangements are also welcome, although I kinda dug the era of Will Sheff as mad fussy recording artiste getting 25 musicians in the studio for a single take, I think I'm way more likely to actually listen to this album the way through
whoever compared Away to Astral Weeks upthread was OTM (that comparison may even have come from the press kit? in which case, lol)
― Tell me who sends these infamous .gifs (bernard snowy), Tuesday, 13 September 2016 14:38 (seven years ago) link
Lol I didn't get no press kit (I think)
― niels, Tuesday, 13 September 2016 15:12 (seven years ago) link
maybe I should be listening to AMC! never tried getting into them tbh
This doesn't really sound anything like Eitzel/AMC to me but they're essential regardless. I recommend their final album The Golden Age as a starting point.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Tuesday, 13 September 2016 16:06 (seven years ago) link
this is the 3rd recent thing i like a lot that's had AMC invoked in discussion about it so i should probably get on that as well
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 13 September 2016 16:21 (seven years ago) link
this showed up on Spotify, last time i checked it wasn't there.
― Bee OK, Wednesday, 14 September 2016 23:36 (seven years ago) link
ciderpress, one of the other two were, I'm guessing, Ryley Walker (slightly more OTM)? what was the third?
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Thursday, 15 September 2016 00:16 (seven years ago) link
god, black sheep boy is still so good. i have the stage names on CD and listen to it much more, and often will try to convince myself that it is superior, but...
― have you ever even read The Drudge Report? Have you gone on Stormfron (k3vin k.), Thursday, 15 September 2016 03:26 (seven years ago) link
xp dont remember the 3rd but i remember thinking 'that's the second time' when someone said it for ryley walker
― ciderpress, Thursday, 15 September 2016 03:43 (seven years ago) link
maybe i just have deja vu
― ciderpress, Thursday, 15 September 2016 03:44 (seven years ago) link
Still listening to this in full every few days, still totally in love with it. Deserves to be mentioned right alongside the other (also great) Albums About Death that have dominated conversation this year (Bowie, Cave, to a lesser extent Touché Amore, more I'm forgetting I'm sure). On recent listens Marissa Nadler's backing vocals have really emerged as an essential bit of coloring.
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Monday, 26 September 2016 23:09 (seven years ago) link
yeah it's really good. I listened to it so much while it was streaming that all the hooks are embedded in my head now, but I can't always remember which song a given snatch of melody occurs in, the whole thing is so much 'of a piece'
― Tell me who sends these infamous .gifs (bernard snowy), Monday, 26 September 2016 23:44 (seven years ago) link
also: the departure from previous albums was what initially stood out, but now I've started to recognize lines of continuity, e.g. the way "Frontman in Heaven" recalls (to my ears) Okkervil River's outstanding cover of Big Star - "O, Dana"
― Tell me who sends these infamous .gifs (bernard snowy), Monday, 26 September 2016 23:49 (seven years ago) link
that really is a great cover, I really love that first Golden Opportunities tape. I'd kill for them to release the full "Basement Tapes"-style session that produced some of those covers and "The President's Dead"
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Monday, 26 September 2016 23:55 (seven years ago) link
3 weeks out and i'm still listening to "Mary On a Wave" on repeat, this is the best song of his career
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 28 September 2016 16:05 (seven years ago) link
masterpiece alert
― niels, Monday, 3 October 2016 06:51 (seven years ago) link
I'm inclined to agree.
Really like every song but She Would Look For Me is the one that is offering up so much more than I initially thought would.
― yugi ex, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:09 (seven years ago) link
and of course, this is a perfect fall album
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Sunday, 23 October 2016 23:40 (seven years ago) link
...perfect for every fall, it turns out. I picked up the 2xLP early this year; the fourth side features a sidelong field recording (including a patch of rain), which is a nice alternative to the "fourth side etching" most bands are doing these days.
― Simon H., Wednesday, 25 October 2017 23:48 (six years ago) link
― ciderpress, Wednesday, September 28, 2016 12:05 PM (one year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
still stand by this
― ciderpress, Thursday, 26 October 2017 00:12 (six years ago) link
not sure if I'd go that far but it is a blissful thing
― Simon H., Thursday, 26 October 2017 01:00 (six years ago) link
couldn't agree more
― niels, Thursday, 26 October 2017 13:29 (six years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiOJBGjnV04
― niels, Monday, 12 February 2018 10:40 (six years ago) link
hmmmmmmm
― Simon H., Monday, 12 February 2018 13:04 (six years ago) link
while it's sonically completely different from Away, which imo was a masterpiece, I think the songwriting seems on point
― niels, Monday, 12 February 2018 13:11 (six years ago) link
dang i figured Away was gonna be a Final Album for the OR bandname
― ciderpress, Monday, 12 February 2018 16:11 (six years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ7bMUsOu7w
Not exactly my taste but oh well, in many ways finding a new direction is a sign of life - long live Okkervil River
― niels, Tuesday, 20 March 2018 19:43 (six years ago) link
dad rock is cool in 2018
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 20 March 2018 21:33 (six years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG3YIoW_2zs
― niels, Tuesday, 17 April 2018 09:16 (six years ago) link