With a progressing sound that welcomes its new direction, The Deep Dark Woods’ Yarrow is a forward-looking excursion brimming with new tones and continuing with their haunting and cinematic lyrical style.
“Fallen Leaves” swoons through an early sixties RnB ballad with a keys hook that sounds like a toy rainbow, chord changes that pillow the flowing delivery and harmony and lines like “the morning light was fading, there I sat and dreamed with the thousands and thousands of fallen leaves.” The Deep Dark Woods have always had the loose feel of Dylan & The Band’s Basement Tapes, and “Roll Julia” has that jumpy energy, a big band feel on a root-five bass, guitars sitting in for horn shots and a northern-Louisiana wedding vibe.
“The Birds Will Stop Their Singing” runs a mournful British folk waltz through some paces, putting an extra 6 on the high hats, which itself raises the tempo in feel considerably, once the band picks up the push underneath, creating room for a wilder drum style from Mike Silverman, before the band the band eventually drops out for a Boldt/Kacy Anderson duet.
Ryan Boldt and Shuyler Jansen have cut a record that updates what The Deep Dark Woods have always done, and not by having done away with the past. The janky, jammy, bounce of their upbeat numbers and the plight of their melancholy have long been defining characteristics. The Deep Dark Woods have always made music you dance outside to, in caps and plaid, dreaming of summer through a snowstorm.