I grew up in the years of American Idiot: The second Bush administration if I’m not trying to be coy about it. My first introduction to politics was watching my family laugh at Bushisms on the new fangled Youtube. Here’s a video for those of you who might have forgotten. My personal favorite is around 00:53.
The point is that I grew up learning to be critical of this country before I ever even thought to appreciate it, and I don’t mean appreciate it like “Wow, I’m so glad I live in a country that’s not experiencing a massive famine,” but appreciate it more like “Wow, I’m so glad I live in a big country with rich culture and compelling history.” When we think of countries with culture we think of Mongolian nomads eagle hunting on the plains or a piece of refined French art hanging in the Louvre. It’s quite an Americentric way to think in a way that we don’t even realize to think that we don’t have a culture.
This seems to be the way that The Decemberists thought for a while. Not only did they not care for America and it’s culture, but they openly disdained it in their song “16 Military Wives” about the media reactions to the Iraq War in 2005, in the music video for which frontman, Colin Meloy, portrayed the United States as a bullying schoolboy to all the other nations of the world. It seems that, for a while, The Decemberists had a love affair with European countries, specifically England, even going so far as to name one of their albums Her Majesty in clear reference to the Queen of England. In 2011, though, they fully embraced their American roots and proved it by naming their album The King is Dead.
The album is much more rustic than their past works, and it should be, because the recorded it in a barn outside of Portland. Where past albums focused on narratives of pirates being eaten by whales or soldiers making out in WWI foxholes The King is Dead focusses on more on places and scenes: a coal mine, a mountainous landscape, shoveling the walkway on a snowy winter day. The album takes a visual picture of America and holds it softly up to the light for appreciation. In their chart-topping song “This Is Why We Fight” they explore the romantic notion of justified battle, similar to that which this country was founded because of.
It’s a beautiful album that makes me think “Someone could tell me something awful about Vietnam right now, and I would still love this land, these people, and my experiences growing up here.Û. It’s a poetic love letter to America that doesn’t say “We’re the greatest country on Earth” but says “It’s my country, and I’ll always be able to appreciate it for that.Û
