Album of the Week: Cleopatra by The Lumineers

I think this is possibly the album I have most listened to in my life. It’s made up of a lot of songs that resonate differently depending on your mood, and I can find comfort in the album no matter how I’m feeling. Happy or sad, I always find myself drawn back to this album. It feels like a comfy blanket.

Indie folk band 'The Lumineers' released this album- their second- in 2016. At the time the band was made up of Wesley Schultz, (lead singer and guitarist) Jeremiah Fraites, (pianist and drummer) and Neyla Pekarek, cellist. There are only 11 tracks on the 33-minute album. Short but sweet.

The tracks on the album all follow each other beautifully, with the lingering melody at the end of each song merging into the following track. The flow of the album is smooth, and every transition is quiet and discrete. The music is minimalist in a way. The band go for the “less is more” tactic and it works so well in making gorgeous music. In fact, the last track of the album, 'Patience' is a short piano piece and their only instrumental song. It’s only a minute and a half long but it’s beautiful. It also makes an appearance at the end of the fifth track, “Angela”. The Lumineers are great and talented storytellers, they make song writing seem easy. The lyrics are both insightful and poetic. And the accompanying music always manages to be modest while always staying interesting.

Wesley Schultz has explained how one day, he was in a taxi in the republic of Georgia and started a conversation with the elderly driver, who ended up telling him her inspiring life story. Schultz was so touched by the lessons she had learnt throughout her life, and the wisdom she shared with him, that he wrote this album as an ode to her. “Cleopatra” is a reference to the woman, who in her young age was full of confidence, ready to take on the world and overflowing in personality. Four of the tracks are part of “The Ballad of Cleopatra”. It’s funny, it was only after the music videos were released that it was apparent these four songs were about the same person since they each work so well on their own. I remember when I first watched the videos in order. Realising they were all about the same woman at different ages blew my mind! The four songs together depict the taxi driver’s life, or what she shared of it to Wesley Schultz.

First of all, “Cleopatra” introduces our main character, the taxi driver, as she tells us about the ‘what ifs’ and where her life decisions have ultimately led her. When she was in her late teens, her father passed away suddenly, and her boyfriend proposed to her, around the same time. Grieving, she declined, and so drove him away forever. She’s regretted it ever since, considering him to be the great love of her life and knowing she would do anything to be with him again. She sees him everywhere she goes and considers him as one of the “what if’s” she still thinks about to this day. The following two songs, “Sleep on the Floor” and “Angela” follow this, as though Cleopatra had started reminiscing about said “what ifs” and is imagining what her life would have been like had she made alternative decisions.

“Sleep on The Floor” is the first “what if”. It’s what the taxi driver’s life would have been like had she accepted her boyfriend’s proposal when she was younger. It’s told from the boyfriend’s point of view. He urges her to come with him, leave the small town they’re from and escape. They drive off with few possessions and no plan. In the music video, you see the young couple hitchhiking, meeting people on the road, traveling and having a small wedding with a few friends outside a bar. The song is about needing to take a leap of faith when making a crazy decision, by trusting your gut and going where life takes you. It’s sweet and hopeful and the uplifting guitar and piano make you forget this is Cleopatra’s alternative life, not a decision she didn’t make. It’s bittersweet but beautiful.

In Angela, the taxi driver is a bit older. She is pregnant but instead of staying in an unhappy marriage, this song imagines what her life would be like had she left early on. But, as she reflects in the song, running away from her problems never got her far. When the excitement of running away settled down, she would have been left with the same internal problems. The end of the song features Schultz’s echo-y voice accompanied by both the signature clapping and guitar which resonate in an almost chilling way, adding to the sadness of the song.

Finally, the last track of the collection of Cleopatra’s stories, features her awaiting her death in “My Eyes”. It’s depressing, it’s borderline haunting but again, beautiful. The dreamy melody talks about the ruins of drug addiction, which I’m guessing the taxi driver must have struggled with. It’s part of the life lessons Schultz drew from his taxi conversation and adds to the Ballad of Cleopatra. Upon hearing the last verse of “Cleopatra”, the first song of the collection, it’s as if the woman has finished reminiscing (if you imagine “Angela” and “Sleep on the Floor” inserted in before the final verse). She accepts the life she’s had without the same regret as she’d started the song with. She isn’t bitter about it. The decisions she made led her to where she is now and the people in her life whom she loves such as the son she was “blessed with” from an unhappy marriage. She doesn’t want to change a thing because without it she wouldn’t have him, and she wouldn’t be the person she is now.

The rest of “Cleopatra” feature similar themes, many of them about reminiscing the past and being content with how things turned out, even if it’s not obvious that it was for the best. The album features a lot of sadness in its songs, but there’s beauty in it. Yes, Cleopatra made regretful decisions that could have led to joy, but you won’t always make the right choices. It’s easy to idealise “what if’s” but at the end of the day, good things emerge from every choice you make and all you can do is appreciate those things and trust your gut when it comes to life choices.

By Alice Charlton