Note To Self...
...stop emailing The Decemberists, collectively and individually. Just because there are links, it doesn't mean you have to click on them! (Also, if they do deign to reply to your queries don't reply back! they have better things to do!) Would you bother Roger Daltrey at home? No! Would you ask silly questions of Keith Richards? Of course not! Now, I would be interested in corresponding with old Robyn Hitchcock, as I've been a fan for like 20 years (really? yes, really!), but when I did chance to speak with him in Chicago a couple years ago, he just mumbled something incoherent, like, "I have to go submerge myself now." I have a feeling that musicians only like contact from fans so much, and then after that point, they're just done. Oh, they might smile and pose for snaps and sign things, but really only in a detached, public persona way.
So, I won't bother them anymore, but I will tell other people how much I like their new song, 16 Military Wives, especially the last verse with the 15 cannibal kings wondering blithely what the dinner bell will bring--after the verses about the titular spouses, the 32 softly-focused brightly-colored eyes, the 32 gently-clenching wrinkled little hands, the 17 company men (out of which only 12 will make it back again), the 5 letters the sergeant sent, the 10 little tear-dripping eyes, the 15 moderate liberal celebrity minds, and the 17 academy chairs (out of which only 7 really even care)--15 celebrity minds served on a leafy bed of 16 military wives!