The breadth of Black Prairie’s second full-length (third if you count the score they did for the Portland Children’s Theater production of “The Storm in the Barn”) is staggering. To start with, it’s 16 songs long -- long enough for producer Tucker Martine have wondered if it’s too long. There are songs written on the spot, and songs written when members were still teenagers.
One song was the result of guitarists Chris Funk and Jon Neufeld sitting down and trying to write a Mastodon song for a string band. Another began as fully formed piece for piano written by Jenny Conlee-Drizos. Drummer John Moen joined the fun this time, bringing the total number of Decemberists to all but one -- singer and songwriter Colin Meloy. All of it was run through the “filter of the Prairie,” as Funk put it.
And so perfectly weird, fun instrumentals settle in comfortably alongside gorgeous lyrical pieces featuring singer/violinist Annalisa Tornfelt and make for a package that’s even more difficult to describe than the band’s not-quite-bluegrass debut.
“This record, all locks were released,” Tornfelt said. “It felt like the doors were open to anything.”