The Builders and The Butchers - Salvation Is A Deep Dark Well

download here

The Builders and The Butchers sound, to an extent, like the love child of Colin Meloy and Australia's The Red Paintings. You can hear a bit of that influence here; Chris Funk, guitarist for the Decemberists, produced and played on this record. Their use of instruments is wide, and despite the similarities to the previously mentioned musicians, they still retain an individual sound that has me tappin' my feet more than a little. I highly suggest giving this a listen, especially if you're a Decemberists fan (but even if you aren't).

From Paste Mag, who have named the B&B's their band of the week:
The Builders And The Butchers' musical output is something of a Pentecostal throw-down—the musical underpinnings are reminiscent of bluegrass, but the performances are raw and unschooled, with Sollee in particular throwing off a maniacally ecclesiastical sort of energy. Imagine the Violent Femmes with all the goofy irony cast aside, and you’ll get a sense of the dark, sparkling, Leadbelly-like terrain covered by death-fixated epics such as “Bottom of the Lake” and “The Gallows.” Thick with characters who bear more in common with Steinbeck’s dustbowl downtrodden than their contemporary counterparts, the band's songwriting is almost entirely instinctive.