The labels 'Americana' and 'Alt-Country' are commonly used interchangeably as if there were no fundamental difference between the two. I think, however, that there is a distinction to be drawn, because 'Americana' seems to me to denote music that is more preoccupied with the heritage of the United States rather than merely being a way to describe a less mainstream version of traditional Country music.
What you hear in the archetypal Americana sound of The Band, for example, is that the tunes are doing more than simply rebelling against the commercialisation of a specific type of music Instead, the songs are trying to make sense of how change in society resonates in American culture and society.
The Portland based sextet, Celilo (pronounced say - lie - low), follow in these noble footsteps with an album which is complex, lyrical and full of a profound sense of melancholy about the times we live in.
These are stories, above all, with a strong sense of place and they evoke an atmosphere which grows deeper on every hearing.
The band's name comes from the Celilo Falls in Oregon and means 'the sound of falling water on rocks'. Fifty years ago, these falls were dynamited out of existence to make way for a dam which submerged the old Celilo village. An entry on the Oregon 150 website affirms, therefore, that the word can also stand for 'sorrow, irrational guilt, irrevocable destruction of a landmark, a people, a culture, a history".
These details help to put this album into the right context and ,particularly, to understand a song which takes its name from the native word for Celilo, Wy-am. This is a song of regret and loss at the lake that once was a river and speaks of "the false road to prosperity on the hard drug of deceit".
These are songs of a highly cohesive and strongly literary character. The opening track ,for instance, (Easter Lily) depicts a mother and daughter lying in an overgrown churchyard where "best dressed sons and daughters pass two by two , sleeping and restless squinting in the light".
The feeling of being out of synch with the modern world is a strong theme as "cars fly like bullets" (Winter Pills) and there are "motels with too many rooms" (Bush Pilot). Yet, equally, these are not songs that give up their secrets easily. Like the best poetry, the lyrics are full of ambiguity and contradiction and this makes them all the richer.
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Pinata is my favourite song on the record. Here, a "busted up" symbol of joy and celebration seems to signify a far greater sense of malaise. It features these great lines: "Go and give some blood and gas up the tank / Head out to the ocean look for artefacts and things".
I'm not sure if it is intentional or not, but these words for me echo lines about searching an attic from Whiskeytown's 'Houses on the Hill' : -"didn't know what I was looking for - maybe just a blanket or artefacts". Even if this association is purely coincidental, the link to the classic 'Strangers Almanac' album is a fortuitous one because the finest songs of Ryan Adams are close neighbours to those of those of Celilo.
This debut album has been two years in the making and of the thirteen tracks, none strike me as fillers or half realised. If there's a criticism, it is that the record could probably benefit from a couple of lighter songs to relieve the intense mood - only the song Pink Sofa gets close to this. Also, Sloan Martin sings with a resigned drawl which suits the reflective mood but as it's not a voice with a great range the songs begin to sound a little samey by the end of the 45 minutes.
These are minor quibbles, though because as a whole this is an album with the sensibility and honesty of a old and trusted friend.
On Clutter of Hooves, a rhetorical question is posed : "Have all your country dreams been city slain?" The answer is left unresolved but as long as there are songs like these around to evoke the spirit of the past and hopes of the future, all is not lost.
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