Horse Feathers, "This Bed"

I count myself fortunate to have had the opportunity to enjoy seeing Horse Feathers perform live, about a month ago. The quartet has recorded three tantalizingly harmonious albums since they formed in 2005, their newest, Thistled Spring, being no different. One of my favorite tracks has been "This Bed," a honey-soaked melody incorporating a beautifully understated entanglement between guitar and banjo set against a forlorn violin.

For all the pleasing orchestration, Justin Ringle's lyrics lend power and emotional weight, grounding the song with the heart-rending tensions of a crumbling relationship. It is a musical dichotomy that Horse Feathers have perfected. As the emotions stack up, a breaking point approaches with the realization that, "The one I love loves me the least / A growing need for apologies, but when I'm wrong I'm weak in the knees." Thereupon, a piteous, self-loathing verse, a cornerstone emotion of the track, is delivered. The tones of the harmonium only add to to the deflating, depthless despair: "It's better now, don't come back to me / Let it be known, I'm a liar and a thief."

Ringle almost seems to lack the faith to deliver the words, and a heavy guilt saturates the song. It is guilt born of mistrust, and fueled by self-blame, and its result is a seclusion erected by the narrator ("Inch by inch, a foot to feet, a growing gap, and miles between / A single lie becomes a beast"). It is there, when the lyrical atmosphere of isolation has come to its peak, that the beautiful arrangement of instruments rises up in support of the powerful verse: "Breathing deep, lying awake to alone to sleep / It's in my mind and in my head / There's a certain type of cold that lives in this bed." Repeated, Ringle's voice strains in the slightest, and the potency of those words builds, the downcast withdrawal of the narrator seems all but cemented. A beautiful melody, with wrenching verse. It is truly captivating.