Chapel Hill's
the Old Ceremony
deliver more '60s-influenced chamber pop ruminations on 2012's
Fairytales and Other Forms of Suicide
. The band's fifth studio effort, the album is a melodic, rambling, low-key work that once again showcases lead singer/songwriter
Django Haskins
' knack for intimate and folky songs that bring to mind a mix of the archly literate work of
Leonard Cohen
and the more atmospheric alt-folk of
Elliott Smith
. Largely built around strummed or fingerpicked acoustic guitar, these songs are also draped with minimal touches of violin, organ, electric guitar, drums, and various percussion instruments. There is also a cinematic, imagistic quality to many of
Haskins
' lyrics that make for an often surrealistic emotional listen. On the ominously poetic duet "Beebe Arkansas,"
and his female partner relate the impossibly true story of a strange, almost Biblical natural event from New Year's Eve 2010 when birds fell from the sky. They sing "5,000 blackbirds raining down over Beebe Arkansas/It's a hard way to end a New Year's Eve/Black feathers everywhere/Cold in the midnight air." Similarly evocative, the midtempo ballad "Elsinore" turns
Shakespeare
's tragic play Hamlet into a bittersweet metaphor for suicide, or perhaps the end of a relationship. A surprisingly warm and tuneful piece of alt-folk cinema, it features
' gentle drawl juxtaposed against his stark lyrics. He croons "Throw your mattress on the sidewalk and keep moving on/The Streets are caving in/There's not much time for getting gone/Leave a note in semaphore/Scattered corns along the shore I don't know what you're waiting for/It's comin' to an end, my friend/This holiday in Elsinore." The song, much like the rest of
, sticks with you, drawing you back into its darkened narrative long after it's ended. ~ Matt Collar