“Summersong”
from the album The Crane Wife
2006
iTunes
Thanks to its baroque, heavily orchestrated pop sound and detailed lyrics that delve into folklore and mythology, the Decemberists were an unlikely lot to receive a major-label advance.
But on October 3, Capitol Records will release the band’s new album, The Crane Wife. Like all the Decemberists’ work, it’s an oddly melodic album with frontman Colin Meloy finding lyrical inspiration in Japanese folk tales and World War II.
“We were talking to more boutique labels … that one would think would be more open to an experimental-type record,” Meloy says. “But Capitol happened to be the ones who met us on our terms. That surprised us.”
Key to those terms — a label that would allow the band to remain signed to Rough Trade in the United Kingdom, and a right of refusal on “pretty much everything,” Meloy says.
The artist also believes the band’s ambitions had outgrown the financial constraints of Kill Rock Stars, which issued its three prior albums. The label, previously home to Sleater-Kinney and Bikini Kill, generally keeps recording budgets at around $2,000, Meloy says.
“That’s what makes (Kill Rock Stars) such a fantastic label,” he says. “It has a great roster of bands, artists who are willing to take those risks. Unfortunately, we’re all about carving out big slabs of orchestral, cinematic pop, and we just can’t do that on $2,000 per record.”
The Decemberists are just one of many indie-friendly signings over at Capitol of late. In addition to recently picking up ex-Matador act Interpol, Capitol’s roster has also been bolstered by singer/songwriter Kevin DeVine, U.K. rap phenom Lily Allen and rock act Sound Team. They join LCD Soundsystem, the Magic Numbers, and Fischerspooner — all well-reviewed artists who have yet to score any major mainstream success.
“I’m interested in the avant-garde,” label president/CEO Andy Slater says. “I wouldn’t classify all of this as avant-garde, but I’m interested in things outside the mainstream as well as the mainstream. So I’m lucky that people find Capitol to be a home for their work.”
The Decemberists bring to Capitol a solid fan base, with its Kill Rock Stars finale, Picaresque, having sold 123,000 units in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The Crane Wife is a highly anticipated album within the indie-rock world, and has already leaked to file-sharing networks.
As Capitol has been gingerly releasing watermarked copies of the album to the press, it is being dissected track by track on the Web. Meloy saw a similar response unfold with Picaresque, and it has him wondering if the idea of a release date is a bit antiquated.
“When a blog is excited about a record, whether it’s a leak or not, it’s a good thing,” Meloy says. “Release dates might become an ancient apparatus, and it might be something that needs to be torn down and rebuilt. The record is out right now, and I don’t know what to do. It’s silly and pointless and hypocritical for me to get mad since I use that technology, too.”
Capitol head of marketing Sharon Lord says the leak won’t affect the label’s plans. “This will be a real word-of-mouth record,” Lord says. “People will hear this and like it and spread the word.”
Slater insists that a significant increase over the sales numbers of Picaresque will not be a measure of the Decemberists’ success on Capitol. He points to such current chart hits as Cherish, Letoya and Corinne Bailey Rae, and says the label’s mainstream achievements allow Capitol the opportunity to sign more adventurous, underground artists.
“We’re lucky that we’ve had success with enough things that we can invest in the artist community in a certain way,” he says. “I didn’t necessarily go into this thinking it’s going to work on a larger level. I just think this has value and is original. On its best days, a major label has an opportunity to be something like a great art gallery.”