Hang Me Oh Hang Me

Dark alt-country. Out of Saskatoon, Canada, The Deep Dark Woods release their second album here with a greater emphasis on production and instrumentation. Hang Me Oh Hang Me is lush and rich in guitars, and country and traditional influences. The band draws on The Byrds, The Grateful Dead, Gram Parsons, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, and Tom Waits as their primary, cited influences. The album has some weird pacing, but is mostly dark and moody. All the band members are male and sing, either in harmonies or on lead vocals at some point. The album is mostly pretty interesting, and the band takes some interesting turns on the alt-country genre. The back half is really strong sounds a bit more varied to my ears. No FCC violations noted.

1. Twangy acoustic guitars flutter about a sad guitar part. County influences are present here, vocals are delicate, sweet, vulnerable. Great opener, with some backing vocals at the end (3:11)
2. Low-key folk intro, title track, poppy construction with slide guitar, backing vocals, and rhythmic electric guitar, guitar solo on bridge (4:22)
3. Feedback entrance, western feel to this one; sounds like a cowboy sound, production is drenched in reverb and is ominous, guitars are subdued, but interesting, organ solo near the end of the song (3:55)
*4. Neil Young-esque longer track, guitars crunch and wander around this dark rock landscape, drums are prominent on this track, vocals echo (6:15)
5. Song about athletes playing sports for the wrong reasons?...back to laid-back country rock, and features a lovely outro with a guitar solo (4:27)
6. This song was penned mostly by the bassist, and it is a bit odd; it is very rhythmic and there are several guitar solos (5:37)
*7. Loungy rhythm and dark, repetitive, hypnotic bass line opens the song, dreamy guitars, and drenched vocals lull a great mood on this song, outro is a variant and is creates an uneasy tension (6:26)
*8. Rich vocal harmony opens the song, slow, trudging number, with thick snare drums propelling the song, accordion shows up at 2:20, vocals are definitely a strong point here on this dark song, outro uses hand claps, maybe gospel influence?(4:50)
9. Loud guitar song explodes out of the gate in this up-tempo, raw rocker, tempo break down for outro; song is cathartic (2:45)
10. Back to country/gospel roots, guitars accent the instrumental breaks, refrains are repetitive, as much of gospel that you’ll hear on the record (3:56)
11. A Neil Young type, rhythmic guitars rip through this song, vocals mourn being in the city and not in the open country?, at around 5 minutes the track transitions into Crazy Horse jam territory, the guitar work is interesting and memorable during this stretch as harmonies build onto the other instrumentation, track fades, and a hidden track comes in at 8 minutes…sort of folky and low-key(12:43)