Magpie and the Dandelion by The Avett Brothers

The ninth album from the Avett Brothers was unanticipated and for all the right reasons. The Avett Brothers have had an incredibly successful career, but Magpie and the Dandelion offered us nothing new from the band. The Avett brothers consist of two brothers, Scott Avett and Seth Avett, however they include three other members – Bob, Joe, Mike and Paul – who tour and record with them. The brothers have officially been recording and making music since 2000, but their whole life have grown up with a passion for music. Considering the band has produced 9 albums in 14 years, and over 100 songs, there’s no doubt that this band has talent, experience, and established a name for themselves. However, their most recent album was a dud compared to The Carpenter.

            The Carpenter included hit after hit of upbeat, powerful music with inspiring lyrics and addicting melodies; Magpie and the Dandelion was a combination of depressing, slow, scratchy songs that was nothing compared to The Carpenter. Almost every song on the album is a classic, angsty, break-up song. Though they haven’t lost their talent or sound, there definitely were not many fans blown away by these eleven songs.

 Magpie and the Dandelion consist of a back and forth combination between whiney tunes and successful lullabies. The Avett Brothers voices are unique and successful in their usual type of song; however they obtain no charming, sleep-inducing, bird-chirping, melodies with their vocals chords. Despite their harsh, croaky voices, they still attempt to sing the soft, slow songs on Magpie and the Dandelion. This is semi-successful on one or two of their tracks, but overall the rest of the whiney, similar songs aren’t songs you want to listen to more than once.

            The Album cover for Magpie and the Dandelion is more eccentric and exciting than their previous eight album covers, which is ironic considering this is probably their least exciting and upbeat album to date. A large percentage of the album has a heavy amount of bird imagery, and one of the brothers, Seth Avett, actually relates himself to the magpie in an interview with Music Mix. (Music Mix) Their secondary song “Morning Song” expresses the bird and magpie references the strongest.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=7EwoxVZTuMM

            “Morning Song” is the most similar track on Magpie and the Dandelion to their older style and sound. Though the slower and more solemn beat isn’t a crowd pleaser 9 times out of ten 10 on this album, The Avett Brothers pull it off in “Morning Song”. This secondary track on their album pulls off the intimate yet gloomy song; however this should have been the only song on the album with this style and subject. The calming acoustic guitar pulls into the lyrics “Hurt so bad / You don’t come around here anymore”, the songs continues on about apathy, alcoholism, hopelessness, and “the magpie on the wire warned of those / Dead until the high / Shamelessly alive until the low”. The song brings a perfect amount of agonizing lyrics with a slow, peaceful acoustic melody to create the heartbreaking track The Avett Brothers were going for, as I mentioned though, this is the only track that succeeds in that goal and it is the only one that was needed on the album. The repetition of the same type of song and style kills Magpie and the Dandelion.

            The Avett Brother stated that Magpie and the Dandelion consisted of a majority of songs that were left over from The Carpenter; that’s exactly what the album feels like – songs that just didn’t quite make the cut (Music Mix).