I just watched the entire series of Sports Night in about two weeks. This was quite an accomplishment. Or something.
Sports can be so fun!
And metaphorical for
our complexities!
Drugs are bad. But wait!
This remains a foggy moral
realm, so tread with care.
Be nice to your kids.
Or they might turn out badly.
You’ll feel bad. Or not.
Season two lesson:
Don’t let your characters
kiss, it kills tension.
Good guys often win--
but probably because of
ABC, not Sorkin.
Dan’s problems are so
damn contrived. His nervousness is
never apparent.
Casey is a quite
bad father, and also a
jackass, so often.
Dana and Casey
kiss—I vomit in my mouth,
throw pillow at TV.
10.26.2006
Horns!
My headphones gave out yesterday. One half of them still works, the other drifts in and out with a crackly static, which works well for some sorts music but clearly not for other kinds. Weirdly, to coincide with this I’ve been deterministically listening to a lot of songs with peppy horn parts. I don’t know why, but they really appeal to me in this dismal weather, in these dismal midterms. These songs also happen to sound very different when the non-working half crackles—a kind of fiery, nervous exuberance that sort of freaks me out.
Okkervil River, “O, Dana”—This is a cover of a Big Star song that appears on Okkervil River’s new Australia only EP, Overboard and DownYou should be able to download it off Said The Gramophone still, and I highly recommend doing so. The lyrics are sort of nonsense, but the song still manages to mean something very visceral. “ I’d rather shoot a woman than a man/ I worry whether this is my last life/ Girl, if you’re listening/ I’m sorry, I can’t help it,” Will Sheff almost yells at the beginning, straight off. This song is intensely desperate, trying much too hard for its own good. The horn comes in at the chorus, compelling some girl named Dana to “come on”, again and again and again.
The Replacements, “Can’t Hardly Wait”—Ashtray floors, dirty clothes and filthy jokes, we will hear about this again, and probably soon. The horn section comes in after “try and try and try” and two wonderful beats when there is no sound, nothing. “I’ll be home when I’m sleeping/ I can’t hardly wait,” wails Westerberg. This song closes out Pleased to Meet Me with empty, disgusting hope, fraught by a loop of brass chords. It’s a completely weird thing, after a record about alcoholism, idolatry, and being bored in the Midwest. But hell if my record about being bored in the Midwest wouldn’t end with joyous trumpets.
Groovy Little Numbers, “Shoot Me Down”-- The Groovy Little Numbers were a Scottish twee band on 53rd & 3rd Records who released something like a total of five songs. But at least two of these songs are really fucking fantastic. They are mean, sad, depressing songs, lyrically but have the most exuberant, joyous sound—lots of horns, lots of guitar hooks. “I can only take so much, but want much more” crescendos into a poppy chorus punctuated by trumpets. “Heart of stone/ but your walls are tumbling down,” we learn, and maybe we do want a little less—but they keep giving us more and we can appreciate the effort, we can appreciate the loneliness inherent in such overblown production. Because after the band packs up and goes home, when I’m left with my crackling headphones and these songs, I can only wonder where exactly my personal horn section has vanished.
Okkervil River, “O, Dana”—This is a cover of a Big Star song that appears on Okkervil River’s new Australia only EP, Overboard and DownYou should be able to download it off Said The Gramophone still, and I highly recommend doing so. The lyrics are sort of nonsense, but the song still manages to mean something very visceral. “ I’d rather shoot a woman than a man/ I worry whether this is my last life/ Girl, if you’re listening/ I’m sorry, I can’t help it,” Will Sheff almost yells at the beginning, straight off. This song is intensely desperate, trying much too hard for its own good. The horn comes in at the chorus, compelling some girl named Dana to “come on”, again and again and again.
The Replacements, “Can’t Hardly Wait”—Ashtray floors, dirty clothes and filthy jokes, we will hear about this again, and probably soon. The horn section comes in after “try and try and try” and two wonderful beats when there is no sound, nothing. “I’ll be home when I’m sleeping/ I can’t hardly wait,” wails Westerberg. This song closes out Pleased to Meet Me with empty, disgusting hope, fraught by a loop of brass chords. It’s a completely weird thing, after a record about alcoholism, idolatry, and being bored in the Midwest. But hell if my record about being bored in the Midwest wouldn’t end with joyous trumpets.
Groovy Little Numbers, “Shoot Me Down”-- The Groovy Little Numbers were a Scottish twee band on 53rd & 3rd Records who released something like a total of five songs. But at least two of these songs are really fucking fantastic. They are mean, sad, depressing songs, lyrically but have the most exuberant, joyous sound—lots of horns, lots of guitar hooks. “I can only take so much, but want much more” crescendos into a poppy chorus punctuated by trumpets. “Heart of stone/ but your walls are tumbling down,” we learn, and maybe we do want a little less—but they keep giving us more and we can appreciate the effort, we can appreciate the loneliness inherent in such overblown production. Because after the band packs up and goes home, when I’m left with my crackling headphones and these songs, I can only wonder where exactly my personal horn section has vanished.
10.24.2006
What's left, What's West.
I promise that sometime soon I will stop writing about songs and start writing about movies, poetry, fiction, culture. But there’s a problem with this theory, the least of which is that the only movie I have seen since coming back to school is Art School Confidential, which sucked. I’ve been compulsively watching Sports Night: The Complete Series, and that is reminding me what I liked and also what I hated about Aaron Sorkin shows. But I haven’t thought of anything articulate to say about that. Expect some haiku soon. Sadly, I don’t have time for much distraction that will take more than five minutes of my time. But escapism, I love the escapism.
I’ve been so tired lately, but unable to sleep. I’ve also been having a little bit of a fiction drought-- trouble writing stories. I’ve decided that this has something to do with not properly and seriously sorting through a lot of what I went through in the past year. So I’m doing that—writing, articulately and with a lot of detail, events in the order which I remember them, in a form that would be really uninteresting for anyone but me to read. I’m hoping that once they’re concretely no longer in my head, I’ll be able to use that space for something a little more original. Songs that evoke the same feeling of trudging on (oddly, they're all about the West):
Liz Phair, “Go West”— “I’m not looking forward to following through/ but it’s better than always running into you,” chants Liz Phair, with the strange echoed loop of her own voice that percolates through the album Whip-smart. The production on the whole album is bizarre, but in this song the vocal doubling works in an indecisive snap. The details in the song are blurry, only Soul Asylum on the radio and the big signs that demarcate lines between states are shared with us. “I’ve got to tear my life apart/ and go west, young man… In some ways it feels like I’ve got something to prove/ but in some ways it’s just something to do,” she sings, and I know exactly what she means. There’s a certain solipsism in such determined coasting. But there are things we have to do for ourselves, because we must.
Everclear, “Santa Monica”—I know that Everclear is not the most hip of bands (neither, for that matter, is Liz Phair. Whatever). This song starts with a great, articulate couplet: “I am still living with your ghost/ Lonely, and dreaming of the west coast”. The guitar riff is rhythmic and steady, a heavy electric lick competing with the screaming lyrics. “I don’t want to be your bad guy, I don’t want to do your sleepwalk dance… I just want to find a place to be alone,” the lyrics rant. Again, with the loneliness—but in the chorus, there is another, a “we”. And in these moments, there’s a concrete balance—we want your ghost to get the hell away from whatever sense of self we're finding, but when it all really does come crashing down, probably somewhere in California, we’d like you (or your memory) to be there too.
Magnetic Fields, “Sunset City”—Another song about moving through the West, as Stephin Merritt plays his country songs with a band that sounds like robots on speed. Or something to that effect. This is an apology from someone who is always, always moving on. The last line of this song is “I won’t miss you , you won’t cry,” though it’s hard to really believe such a thing. Later, there will be tears. On the highway as the roads curve into another state and the speaker understands what’s been left behind—“life is too short to hang around”—that, I can agree with. But the moments of ephemeral selfishness fade out into the road, and getting there is getting over any concept we may have had that we could ever be alone. So we can drive and we can feel whole for once, while understanding that there will always be another place or another person (even if that person is ourselves) to get the fuck over.
I’ve been so tired lately, but unable to sleep. I’ve also been having a little bit of a fiction drought-- trouble writing stories. I’ve decided that this has something to do with not properly and seriously sorting through a lot of what I went through in the past year. So I’m doing that—writing, articulately and with a lot of detail, events in the order which I remember them, in a form that would be really uninteresting for anyone but me to read. I’m hoping that once they’re concretely no longer in my head, I’ll be able to use that space for something a little more original. Songs that evoke the same feeling of trudging on (oddly, they're all about the West):
Liz Phair, “Go West”— “I’m not looking forward to following through/ but it’s better than always running into you,” chants Liz Phair, with the strange echoed loop of her own voice that percolates through the album Whip-smart. The production on the whole album is bizarre, but in this song the vocal doubling works in an indecisive snap. The details in the song are blurry, only Soul Asylum on the radio and the big signs that demarcate lines between states are shared with us. “I’ve got to tear my life apart/ and go west, young man… In some ways it feels like I’ve got something to prove/ but in some ways it’s just something to do,” she sings, and I know exactly what she means. There’s a certain solipsism in such determined coasting. But there are things we have to do for ourselves, because we must.
Everclear, “Santa Monica”—I know that Everclear is not the most hip of bands (neither, for that matter, is Liz Phair. Whatever). This song starts with a great, articulate couplet: “I am still living with your ghost/ Lonely, and dreaming of the west coast”. The guitar riff is rhythmic and steady, a heavy electric lick competing with the screaming lyrics. “I don’t want to be your bad guy, I don’t want to do your sleepwalk dance… I just want to find a place to be alone,” the lyrics rant. Again, with the loneliness—but in the chorus, there is another, a “we”. And in these moments, there’s a concrete balance—we want your ghost to get the hell away from whatever sense of self we're finding, but when it all really does come crashing down, probably somewhere in California, we’d like you (or your memory) to be there too.
Magnetic Fields, “Sunset City”—Another song about moving through the West, as Stephin Merritt plays his country songs with a band that sounds like robots on speed. Or something to that effect. This is an apology from someone who is always, always moving on. The last line of this song is “I won’t miss you , you won’t cry,” though it’s hard to really believe such a thing. Later, there will be tears. On the highway as the roads curve into another state and the speaker understands what’s been left behind—“life is too short to hang around”—that, I can agree with. But the moments of ephemeral selfishness fade out into the road, and getting there is getting over any concept we may have had that we could ever be alone. So we can drive and we can feel whole for once, while understanding that there will always be another place or another person (even if that person is ourselves) to get the fuck over.
10.22.2006
If I don't grow old, I won't become an antique.
Comet Gain is pretty boring, in certain terms. They’re British, have both male and female members, and in the public consciousness seem to basically belong to David Christiansen, who reformed the band in 2001. They are sort of cliche, with an angsty new wave groove that’s very derivative of Television Personalities, but a little softer and more complex. Their newest record, City Fallen Leaves is entirely too spotty to enjoy as a whole. However, Christiansen’s apathetically moving drawl is interesting to hear, especially when the words turn lovely, which they often do with a poetic pungency. Two songs in particular stand out. The mellow and nostalgic “Days I Forgot to Write Down” is evocative of having compromised on life, and lost what you were trying at anyway. The sentiment of loss is charming but turns out to be ultimately wordless and inarticulate. “These are the days I forgot to write down/ these are the words buried deep in the ground/ They don’t make a sound/ They sing oooo”, goes the refrain, which is pleasant and haunting, beautifully creepy. We keep looking for love, “as if that was enough”, and we keep trying to pry at moments that have slipped away in all but the most visceral of ways. They won’t be written; they won’t be expressed. However, “if you’re fucked, it’s alright/ it’s Saturday night and you are alive/ And you are alright,” he sings, with some emotion, and that seems to be enough, at a certain point. We can be satisfied with our graceful aging if we take stock of what we have, instead of what we don’t have anymore. In the catchier “Seven Sisters to Silverlake”, a lost friend writes letters, which inspire us “to understand/ to feel complete and write down the mirage/ and sing hello morning goodbyes”. And maybe in that process, both the writing and the living and singing, maybe somewhere in there is the unity of what we forgot and that strength allows us to go on, perhaps even compels us to go on.
10.15.2006
Such a stupid sentiment, but write it once again.
This week, there was an intense cold snap in Chicago. I woke up on Thursday morning to a layer of snow on the trees outside my window, the sun all blushing and translucent. It was highly unpleasant. The snow did melt by midday, but the fact that it had come so early and with such panache did frighten me. Classes have really started, which means my life consists of reading PDF files on computer screens and carrying around expensive paper with a horrifically enlarged version of my face on it. There are two songs which have stuck in this week. Predictably, both of them are old songs, and both of them are dramatic in a way my life currently (and thankfully) fails to be.
Arab Strap, “The Shy Retirer”.
I’ve never much been into Arab Strap. Though this choice is probably left over from my militantly-anti-Belle-and-Sebastian days (oh, how I hated them!), I think it still holds some legitimacy. Arab Strap are a little overly solipsistic, a little too intense for me. But the Scottish drawl in this song sucked me into it, and the charming couplet that pops in about halfway through: “You know I’m always moaning, but you jumpstart my serotonin”. This song is a short film, the Who/What/Where/Why all un-artfully obscured, but the moment captured beautifully, the narrator pushy and under the influence of something nasty but lovely. He’s angry, and hurt, and purposeful (“We promised ourselves before we came here/ we’d do something we regret/ these people are your friends/ this cunted circus never ends/ I won’t remember anything you say”). He’s so nasty and charming, so accurate. The song has a tense string section, and horns slipping in as well. This song is worthlessness to the fullest extent of its use. The world is all anger, standing around, pointless drugs. The world is in shambles, but it is very well-articulated and we can’t ask for much else these days, can we? At the end we’re left with a tight drum loop, standing there on its own. Am I supposed to be dancing? Was I supposed to be dancing all along?
Tom Waits- “Hold On”.
This song is 5 minutes and 33 seconds long. It (and I know this is a travesty, please forgive me) reminds me of Bruce Springsteen. A lot. And I know Tom Waits is better in some ways than Bruce, and I know he’s more original and completely different. But this is a ballad about a relationship and leaving town and physical desolation but emotional salvation. The line, “Go ahead and call the cops/ You don’t meet nice girls in coffee shops” is somehow completely moving and honest. And that honesty swings into the next line, “She said, ‘baby I still love you/ sometimes there’s nothing left to do’”. The sentiment of loving something that’s perfectly flawed is a cliché. But in all reconstruction, there’s the ghost of destruction, and it doesn’t have to be a menace. This song quickly becomes about accepting the problems in the past, the lame substitutes which become our essentials. As he growls, “You build it up, you wreck it down/ You tear your mansion to the ground,” we’re confronted with the fact of those ruins, and here we are, carrying them in our pockets and feeling the sharp edges as well as the smooth ones. For five minutes, there is a unison between the broken and that continual, awful process of repairing, between clutching something tightly and remembering how it once supported us. I’ve never been comforted (so much as amazed and terrified) by Tom Waits’ voice, but at the end of this song I want it to be record, so I can physically move the needle back to the beginning of the loop and start it again.
Arab Strap, “The Shy Retirer”.
I’ve never much been into Arab Strap. Though this choice is probably left over from my militantly-anti-Belle-and-Sebastian days (oh, how I hated them!), I think it still holds some legitimacy. Arab Strap are a little overly solipsistic, a little too intense for me. But the Scottish drawl in this song sucked me into it, and the charming couplet that pops in about halfway through: “You know I’m always moaning, but you jumpstart my serotonin”. This song is a short film, the Who/What/Where/Why all un-artfully obscured, but the moment captured beautifully, the narrator pushy and under the influence of something nasty but lovely. He’s angry, and hurt, and purposeful (“We promised ourselves before we came here/ we’d do something we regret/ these people are your friends/ this cunted circus never ends/ I won’t remember anything you say”). He’s so nasty and charming, so accurate. The song has a tense string section, and horns slipping in as well. This song is worthlessness to the fullest extent of its use. The world is all anger, standing around, pointless drugs. The world is in shambles, but it is very well-articulated and we can’t ask for much else these days, can we? At the end we’re left with a tight drum loop, standing there on its own. Am I supposed to be dancing? Was I supposed to be dancing all along?
Tom Waits- “Hold On”.
This song is 5 minutes and 33 seconds long. It (and I know this is a travesty, please forgive me) reminds me of Bruce Springsteen. A lot. And I know Tom Waits is better in some ways than Bruce, and I know he’s more original and completely different. But this is a ballad about a relationship and leaving town and physical desolation but emotional salvation. The line, “Go ahead and call the cops/ You don’t meet nice girls in coffee shops” is somehow completely moving and honest. And that honesty swings into the next line, “She said, ‘baby I still love you/ sometimes there’s nothing left to do’”. The sentiment of loving something that’s perfectly flawed is a cliché. But in all reconstruction, there’s the ghost of destruction, and it doesn’t have to be a menace. This song quickly becomes about accepting the problems in the past, the lame substitutes which become our essentials. As he growls, “You build it up, you wreck it down/ You tear your mansion to the ground,” we’re confronted with the fact of those ruins, and here we are, carrying them in our pockets and feeling the sharp edges as well as the smooth ones. For five minutes, there is a unison between the broken and that continual, awful process of repairing, between clutching something tightly and remembering how it once supported us. I’ve never been comforted (so much as amazed and terrified) by Tom Waits’ voice, but at the end of this song I want it to be record, so I can physically move the needle back to the beginning of the loop and start it again.
10.10.2006
Endings.
I’ll be the first to admit my obsession with breaking up. I don’t think of all relationships as doomed, but in my mind there is something creepily eerie about committing yourself to another person for a long period of time. Additionally, I have a plethora of unpleasant songs to back this sentiment up. Observe the breakup songs I have on repeat at this particular moment.
1) The Mountain Goats, “No Children”.
Clearly, with its catchy piano hook and scathing (scathing!) lyrics, this song belongs at the top of any list. John Darnielle writes with such eager gusto about the dead end marriage of his narrator that you can’t help but wince, shrug and sing along. “I hope you die! I hope we both die!” This song makes even the worst marriage look like grotesque, catchy fun. Maybe this will be my wedding song. Probably not.
2) Why?, “Gemini (Birthday Song)”.
This strange gem of a song is hard to access at first because of its weird lyrical choices. But sometimes the haze of physical specifics lifts into beautiful and specific couplets of horror: “When I ask you to kiss my pulse, you offer to start the shower/ I want a verb, and you give me a noun/ What do you dream up while I tongue you down?” The increasing distance in the relationship expands in a fuzzy loop of sound, until we are left chanting with the weird, cold voice chanting, “You know my build, you know my size, the degree to which my eyes are astigmatic.” This relationship, though intense, clearly has passed its expiration date.
3) Richard and Linda Thompson, “Shoot Out the Lights”.
YES. People just can’t manage to break up this cruelly anymore. Even the Mates of State breakup record won’t be close to this perfection.
4) Tullycraft, “I Kept the Beach Boys”.
This is one of Tullycraft’s most sparse songs. They are not masters of the break-up (twee pop is generally better for the sickly sweet intensity of the getting together. Or in the case of Tullycraft, re-getting-together. Maybe that’s why I continue to secretly hate it, or why whenever I have a mental breakdown, there is inevitably twee playing in my head). This song has a military drumbeat, and lyrics start halfway through. They consist of about five sentences that manage to convey the whole story of the relationship ending with, “I went to Memphis and you moved to Detroit/ You took the That Dog and I kept the Beach Boys with me.” And there, we have the essential reasons for breaking up in a nutshell. You are in different places with incompatible music. Duh.
1) The Mountain Goats, “No Children”.
Clearly, with its catchy piano hook and scathing (scathing!) lyrics, this song belongs at the top of any list. John Darnielle writes with such eager gusto about the dead end marriage of his narrator that you can’t help but wince, shrug and sing along. “I hope you die! I hope we both die!” This song makes even the worst marriage look like grotesque, catchy fun. Maybe this will be my wedding song. Probably not.
2) Why?, “Gemini (Birthday Song)”.
This strange gem of a song is hard to access at first because of its weird lyrical choices. But sometimes the haze of physical specifics lifts into beautiful and specific couplets of horror: “When I ask you to kiss my pulse, you offer to start the shower/ I want a verb, and you give me a noun/ What do you dream up while I tongue you down?” The increasing distance in the relationship expands in a fuzzy loop of sound, until we are left chanting with the weird, cold voice chanting, “You know my build, you know my size, the degree to which my eyes are astigmatic.” This relationship, though intense, clearly has passed its expiration date.
3) Richard and Linda Thompson, “Shoot Out the Lights”.
YES. People just can’t manage to break up this cruelly anymore. Even the Mates of State breakup record won’t be close to this perfection.
4) Tullycraft, “I Kept the Beach Boys”.
This is one of Tullycraft’s most sparse songs. They are not masters of the break-up (twee pop is generally better for the sickly sweet intensity of the getting together. Or in the case of Tullycraft, re-getting-together. Maybe that’s why I continue to secretly hate it, or why whenever I have a mental breakdown, there is inevitably twee playing in my head). This song has a military drumbeat, and lyrics start halfway through. They consist of about five sentences that manage to convey the whole story of the relationship ending with, “I went to Memphis and you moved to Detroit/ You took the That Dog and I kept the Beach Boys with me.” And there, we have the essential reasons for breaking up in a nutshell. You are in different places with incompatible music. Duh.
10.09.2006
Triptych.
Architecture in Helsinki, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah: Monday
The Vic Theatre before a large thunderstorm is a strangely happy place. Weirdly, the most affecting thing about this show was the lighting design, which was gorgeous and highly pigmented. The bands both put on competent sets. Architecture had an early Halloween: various members of the band were dressed as a sports star, an indie-rock loving Trotskyite, a stuffed animal, a member of Panic! At the Disco, and an Abercrombie model. This was weird, but even more bizarre was the flood on Belmont when the concert ended. Completely soaked and cold, the concert was almost totally flooded out of my mind by the rain and thunder, hours upon hours of it. In retrospect, the cutely cartoonish clouds that Clap Your Hands had as their background were facile and poorly used. Very little indie rock can actually stand up to the elements, and I suppose this was no exception.
Mt. Eerie, Calvin Johnson: Thursday
The seasons managed to align perfectly for this show, which took place in the eerie, gothic Hutchinson courtyard. One of the first chilly nights of the year combined beautifully with the gawky coldness of both performers. Leaves stuck in neat piles on the edge of the courtyard, everyone got stoned and many cigarettes were smoked by various Northside hipsters and radio station staff members. Walking around with a billfold in my pocket, I could barely concentrate on the actual music, just its presence in the scene. The moon was caught in the trees, and everything was breathing and I was giddy because it was autumn. I wish I could say more about the performances, but all I know is that they were crisp and eerie, like the night itself. Afterwards we collapsed into a Voxtrot dance party which was really just jumping, and we jumped poorly on the slate, in front of the dry fountain. That was lovely enough.
Elvis Perkins, Okkervil River: Sunday
Felt ill before I went, but was pleasantly impressed (again) by Will Sheff, Jonathan Meiburg, and really, the whole band. The Okkervil River boys are adorable, but meaningfully so. They all sing along to every song, they banter, they charm. It’s more than the fact that I love these songs, and that I ventured all the way up to Schuba’s with other people who love these songs. Sometimes it’s the small, charming quirks (drunken debauchery, iffy wardrobe choices, and a dobra) that that make bands work for me live. Though I’ve never seen a live show that I dislike entirely, it’s really rare to stand there and sing along with a room full of people you don’t know, some of whom wrote and regularly perform the songs. It’s this kind of synthesis, I might even suggest love, that really makes a concert worthwhile for me. To know that we are there all together, for no particular reason, and to know that you are wearing a Hans Bellmer t-shirt and spinning a story without sense, that we all have hope or something to hang our hope on when we manage to catch up with it. The evening started with these words, trembled by Elvis Perkins, “While we are sleeping, the shadows flow, time files, the phone rings, there is a silence and everybody tries to sing—oh, oh.”
The Vic Theatre before a large thunderstorm is a strangely happy place. Weirdly, the most affecting thing about this show was the lighting design, which was gorgeous and highly pigmented. The bands both put on competent sets. Architecture had an early Halloween: various members of the band were dressed as a sports star, an indie-rock loving Trotskyite, a stuffed animal, a member of Panic! At the Disco, and an Abercrombie model. This was weird, but even more bizarre was the flood on Belmont when the concert ended. Completely soaked and cold, the concert was almost totally flooded out of my mind by the rain and thunder, hours upon hours of it. In retrospect, the cutely cartoonish clouds that Clap Your Hands had as their background were facile and poorly used. Very little indie rock can actually stand up to the elements, and I suppose this was no exception.
Mt. Eerie, Calvin Johnson: Thursday
The seasons managed to align perfectly for this show, which took place in the eerie, gothic Hutchinson courtyard. One of the first chilly nights of the year combined beautifully with the gawky coldness of both performers. Leaves stuck in neat piles on the edge of the courtyard, everyone got stoned and many cigarettes were smoked by various Northside hipsters and radio station staff members. Walking around with a billfold in my pocket, I could barely concentrate on the actual music, just its presence in the scene. The moon was caught in the trees, and everything was breathing and I was giddy because it was autumn. I wish I could say more about the performances, but all I know is that they were crisp and eerie, like the night itself. Afterwards we collapsed into a Voxtrot dance party which was really just jumping, and we jumped poorly on the slate, in front of the dry fountain. That was lovely enough.
Elvis Perkins, Okkervil River: Sunday
Felt ill before I went, but was pleasantly impressed (again) by Will Sheff, Jonathan Meiburg, and really, the whole band. The Okkervil River boys are adorable, but meaningfully so. They all sing along to every song, they banter, they charm. It’s more than the fact that I love these songs, and that I ventured all the way up to Schuba’s with other people who love these songs. Sometimes it’s the small, charming quirks (drunken debauchery, iffy wardrobe choices, and a dobra) that that make bands work for me live. Though I’ve never seen a live show that I dislike entirely, it’s really rare to stand there and sing along with a room full of people you don’t know, some of whom wrote and regularly perform the songs. It’s this kind of synthesis, I might even suggest love, that really makes a concert worthwhile for me. To know that we are there all together, for no particular reason, and to know that you are wearing a Hans Bellmer t-shirt and spinning a story without sense, that we all have hope or something to hang our hope on when we manage to catch up with it. The evening started with these words, trembled by Elvis Perkins, “While we are sleeping, the shadows flow, time files, the phone rings, there is a silence and everybody tries to sing—oh, oh.”
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