The Sunset Tree

This album has been added to 1 private list and 6 public lists:

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  The Music Slut Committee

  Steve

  "I don’t even know where to start with this one.

  I think “abusive households” and “daddy issues” can make up their own genre at this point. Everyone has a story about this kind of thing, big or small. But there’s this incredible maturity to The Sunset Tree that makes it feel a cut above the rest. While a lot of songs would be content to paint a picture of a broken household and wallow in that mood, Darnielle goes there. We indulge, perhaps guiltily, in full-fledged revenge fantasies and pointed, stabbing accusations. There’s escapism, yes. We run away and listen to music and crank up the volume to drown out the sorrow, but those unsavory thoughts that most people would be ashamed to admit they have…Darnielle is unafraid to open up and take us there. But what I like the most about the lyricism of the album is how effortlessly we go between “multi-layered metaphors that drawn upon folklore and Christian ideology” to the very literal “my dad hurt my mom and I want to hurt him back.” Both of those feel right at home next to each other.

  I’ve listened to this album a lot in the last few years. I listen to Up the Wolves almost every day. And that’s because, as I continue to work on my book, I need to keep going to darker and darker places within myself and this album has done a lot to help me keep an even keel throughout. It’s like a flashlight in a dark cave, helping me explore those dark feelings that I need to unearth, without tripping and falling deeper into the abyss.

  The combination of Up the Wolves and Pale Green Things is especially important to me because its representative of a very unique feeling that I haven’t really found anywhere else in art. Whenever we think about acceptance and forgiveness, it’s often shown to end with hugs and tears and everyone emerging happier on the other side. But it doesn’t always work like that. In fact, it frequently doesn’t. People aren’t always sorry for what they’ve done. They may not even be aware of the ways they’ve hurt you, when they’ve done it, or how. At what point do you stop waiting for them for them to come around and acknowledge and apologize, and just move on with your life?

  “There's gonna come a day when you feel better, you’ll rise up free and easy on that day and float from branch to branch, lighter than the air. Just when that day is coming, who can say?”

  I don’t know. I’m not there yet. I’m still angry. I’m still sad. But this is the album that helped me realize it’s okay to be angry and sad, that it takes time to accept the things that led me there, and that I can forgive on my own terms, and that forgiveness doesn't mean that things will be necessarily be Good." - Alex

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  Recommendations for Jennifer

  Zane

  Heavy topics, but the album doesn't let that overwhelm you. I'm surprised by how good it is every time I listen to it.

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  Listen List 4

  Peter Gerald Dawg
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  2005

  James
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  Top 100

  Matt Kreiling
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