Seattle’s Foghorns strip it down to the Americana basics with “Queen of Decatur,” leaving just vocals and acoustic guitar to tell a complex personal story in simple musical terms. This is a bleak, beautiful “end-of-the-line” set piece: a hotel parking lot, small-town despair and the fleeting relief of covert lust underneath a green bedspread and yellow sheets. The chorus (pre-chorus?) begins with “you wouldn’t know it was a holiday outside / highway doesn’t change” followed by “this is no place to start a second life / everybody knows our name” and goddamn me if this isn’t the kind of hardscrabble Midwestern metaphysics befitting writers like Dan Chaon or the late Denis Johnson. I would stand on anyone’s coffee table and declare the greatness of the Foghorns if need be or I could just play this song and wait. Happy holidays, you sad, lovely cretins.
Don’t miss your chance to hear this song in its full ensemble glory this Saturday at Conor Byrne as the Foghorns close out our Ball of Wax Winter Spectacular.