Caedmon's Call - Long Line of Leavers
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CD Details
Artist: Caedmon's CallEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2000-10-10
Music Label: Essential
Soundtracks:
- Only One
- Love Is Different
- Prepare Ye the Way
- Prove Me Wrong
- Mistake of My Life
- Masquerade
- What You Want
- Valleys Fill First
- Can't Lose You
- Love Along
- Dance
- Piece of Glass
- Ballad of San Francisco
Music reviews of Long Line of Leavers
Music Review: Experimental, Eclectic, and Moody Stretch for the Band
Rating: 5 Stars
It's been several years now since Caedmon's Call was arguably the most popular contemporary Christian band in America, with only Jars of Clay challenging it for front-runner status. In the middle of this period, the band released its third (nationally released) album, Long Line of Leavers, in October 2000. The band could have played it safe and continued in the folk-rock tradition of its much-loved predecessor, 1999's 40 Acres. Instead, Caedmon's Call took a left-hand turn and created a very experimental album that critics generally loved but that also left some die-hard fans less enthusiastic.
The album takes the band in bold new directions musically. "The Only One," the album's opening song and first single, lets you know immediately that things are different with its horn section and increased use of a mood organ; it's as radical (and arguably almost as experimental) a departure for the band as the song "Tusk" was for Fleetwood Mac back in the late 1970s. (The same can be said to an extent of Long Line of Leavers when compared with the Tusk album as a whole, although no one in Caedmon's Call is anywhere near as experimental as Lindsey Buckingham was in Fleetwood Mac.) "What You Want" gives the band a wide-open sky type of feeling that both reflects and anticipates the bigger sound of pop music as the 1990s segued into the new decade. "Masquerade," surprisingly, has a jazzy lounge feeling. "Mistake of My Life" is a humorous Beatlesesque romp. While many of the other songs fit superficially into a folk rock categorization, different instrumentation ensures that Caedmon's Call never sounds like the same band that made its previous two albums. This is a good thing, as the band members appear to be pushing themselves as artists. Undoubtedly, much of this increased artistry is due to the skills of two new producers, Ed Cash and Monroe Jones, and, perhaps most of all, the addition of musical wunderkind (and then high-school-aged teenager) Josh Moore.
Lyrically, the album essentially deals with human beings' continuing quest for love--whether from other people or God--and the consequent restlessness that makes them "leavers" rather than committed to the situation wherein they find themselves. Six of the 13 songs indirectly or directly speak to human beings' relationships with God, another three address romantic love, two address other human experiences, one looks at how God is reflected (or not) in the life of a city, and one combines several of these themes. All of the lyrics are thoughtful and poetic, raising complex issues without searching for easy answers.
The band covers these different sides of the human experience very well. "The Only One," one of the gifted Aaron Tate's more complex songs, provides the theological underpinnings for the album, tracing human beings' tendency to "leave" back to their first parents, and concluding that God is the only being who will "never leave." Midway through the album, Derek Webb expands on this thought by contemplating that human beings will never be "what [God] wants." "Prove Me Wrong" addresses doubts concerning God from a thoroughly Calvinist perspective, while "Valleys Fill First" communicates the truth that God will always seem distant at times to human beings, and "Love Alone" is a prayer for God's empowerment. The most traditionally Christian-themed song on the album is a cover of John Michael Talbot's "Prepare Ye the Way," a call to repentance.
The three songs on romantic love all come from the pen of Derek Webb, who almost has enough songs for his own solo album on Long Line of Leavers. While some listeners might be tempted to apply the sentiments to God (with some justification, for they do have applicability in that direction), the lyrics in each case indicate that another human being is in view. These songs seem intensely personal, from the account of how a postcard from an ex makes a speaker realize that "Love Is Different" than anyone thinks, to the fear that in falling in love a speaker might be making the "Mistake of [his or her] Life," to the quiet desperation that some have of potentially facing lifelong singleness in "Can't Lose You." On the latter song, Webb satirizes the way some evangelicals speak of "the gift of singleness": "But maybe I have the gift that everyone speaks so highly of/Funny how no one wants it."
Four other songs are more eclectic lyrically. Webb's "Dance" takes the perspective of a senior citizen (evidently Webb's grandmother) who longs for Heaven so that she can regain mobility in her body and see loved ones again. Another song from the pen of Webb and Danielle Young looks at sin and compares the source of temptation to a "Piece of Glass." Cash's "Masquerade" looks at the deceptive allurements of a city and how they are dark compared to God's light. The closing song, "Ballad of San Francisco" by Webb, wraps many of the album's themes into one short, jangly folk tune. Here, the speaker has a love/hate relationship with the city he or she lives in and is struggling with being single. The "you" in this song may refer to an ex but can also be taken as God.
The vocal performances on the album range are often very good to excellent, with Webb standing out above the band's two other vocalists. Some people love Danielle Young's two lead vocals on this album ("Masquerade" and "Piece of Glass"), but while she always has been the band's best vocalist overall, she would wait to truly come into her own until 2003's Back Home. Her husband Cliff does a generally good job; he likewise would greatly improve a few years down the road.
Long Line of Leavers ultimately is nothing if not experimental, eclectic, and moody. It was Caedmon's Call's most artistic (though not most accessible) statement to that point in time. Listening to it six-and-a-half years after I first bought it, I find it to be a much better album and far more compelling than I remembered. There's something to be said for albums that really stretch artists, and this album finds the band just about in full flight.
Description of Long Line of Leavers
You'll find nothing here to dispel the notion that Caedmon's Call is one of the up-and-comers of the Christian music world. Long Line of Leavers, while perhaps not as strong as its brilliant predecessor (40 Acres), shows us a maturing band whose recording process now fully employs Caedmon's ensemble prowess. "Prepare Ye the Way" and "Valley" chronicle the fact, melting the vocals of husband-and-wife duo Cliff and Danielle Young into the acoustic-oriented folk rock for which the band is known so well. Derek Webb continues to prove himself one of the genre's finest writers here with the wonderfully moving "Dance" and the energetic "What You Want." Not to be outdone, Aaron Tate, the only member of the band who does not sing or play, offers songwriting gems in "Prove Me Wrong" and the aforementioned "Valley." Caedmon's Call clearly understand their strengths (songwriting and ensemble performance) and showcase them well in this worthy third release. --Michael LyttleGeneral CDs
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