Folk music is one of the oldest, most diluded, yet prestigious genres of music. So as frustrating and understandable as it is to hear a good 10 genres ascribed to Midlake—psych folk, indie folk, progressive folk, contemporary folk, alternative pop, etc.—considering The Courage of Others and their past work folk is inappropriate. It's essentially layered pop music with strong folk influences. All of this may sound amazingly bland on paper, and although that is a perfectly understandable response, it would also be a mistake to write off Midlake entirely for their quaint approach. However, on The Courage of Others, the group crosses that fine line between quaint and bland that they had been toying with.
Midlake's last album, 2006's Trials of Van Occupanther, was a comforting conversation that felt like a more eclectic, less eccentric John Vanderslice. The melodies and soft lyrics flowed by and landed comfortably in listeners' ears like layers of blankets, distinguishing each one with smooth changes in design.
However, on The Courage of Others, Midlake retreats to a lonely corner where they have finally succumbed to the overwhelming pressures that surrounded their previous position of comforting listeners. Melodies are buried as contrasting leads are taken in turn by either dancing finger-picking, drudgingly distorted guitars or a flute. On some songs this finds success, such as the opener ""Acts of Man."" Its melody is more prominent and lyricisms inquiring, making the song an inviting introduction to the band's slightly new flavor. ""Small Mountain"" and ""Rulers, Ruling All Things"" are even more successful while reinforcing the new, distant position bluntly through lines like, ""I only want to be left to my own ways."" These tracks follow a similar formula of straightforward agreeable songwriting. However, as enjoyable as any listener can find these songs, it is hard not to come back to that ambiguous descriptor: agreeable.
Even if those tunes are found wholly intoxicating, most of the others lose all traction when vague melodies compete with either depths of trudging guitars or the skyward walls of sound coming from the rhythm accompaniment. This is particularly true on ""Fortune,"" a song of fairly lackluster moaning over the unknown, and the closer, ""The Ground,"" on which the intriguing struggle on guitar is made translucent by overdubbed flute and rhythm, resulting in a perfect muddle. ""The Courage of Others"" provides another representation of this. All of the reserved introspections take shape as vocalist Tim Smith articulates the new approach, ""I will never have the courage of others / I will not approach you at all / I was always taught to worry about things / All the many things you can't control.""
All of a sudden the layers of warm blankets laid on listeners on Van Occupanther have been taken back to be used by the actual band members, who are now wrapping themselves up while shyly relating their solitary struggles from a lonesome corner. Sad but affecting, this style needs to be utterly personal underneath the haze. However, too often Midlake's vague melodies don't allow listeners to get lost, as it is simply too tough to decipher what exactly they want to be heard.
