Predictable Me.
So of course, unemployed and with dead car (yes, that, too) and with an uncertain future in Atlanta, a weekend visit to Beachtown to turn in my thesis and hang out with friends becomes one of the best weekends ever. It was Place-under-glass good. It was Awareness-that-this-is-a-golden-memory-in-the-making good, the way only fleeting moments can be. Moments lived under the weight of awareness of their finite nature. That we know we can’t keep.
During a Saturday morning sunny drive to the beach, a friend and I listened to Smog. Smog, as you may or may not know, is the alias of musician Bill Callahan, a man whom I’ve long assumed, from the sound of his seasoned voice and wise old lyrics, to be a creepily handsome but weathered old man, in the tradition of the Devil character from Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? I recently found out that he is not; this was disappointing. Rather than a figure of fable, he’s like, a completely normal thirtysomething dude who’s bedded both Joanna Newsom and Chan Marshall. (And yes, I am aware that the word “bedded” makes everything sound worse and makes me sound like a writer from freaking Star magazine.)
The album A River Ain’t Too Much to Love is so beautiful, I feel kind of unworthy to listen to it and claim it for my own, and then I realized that this is precisely why I never listen to it. Even though I’ve had it for several years, my one wish with this album is for it always to feel happened-upon and new. I don’t want to learn all the words. There is so much lurvely music out there in the world, and I fill as many free spaces as possible with it. But something about this album. It’s so good that I harbor this sneaking suspicion that it’s too good for me. That it’s too good for the rest of my records, even. That it will raise the bar and wreck the happy equilibrium I’ve cultivated in my current community of cds.
Basically, there’s a concern concerning balance, Henshaw. There’s a fear of seesaws. Luckily, on this geographical end there is Marshall, who is pretty damn heavy in terms of import, and at least one amazing friend here (you know who you are, Missy-sitting-next-to-me), too, but I’ve gotta shake a leg and I dunno, where to go with this metaphor? Toss some gold ingots down over here. I am looking forward to the day when contentedness is not accompanied by some necessary “Carpe diem” sting. Does this happen? I have created a bad, bad precedent of not staying anywhere long enough to find out.
So of course, unemployed and with dead car (yes, that, too) and with an uncertain future in Atlanta, a weekend visit to Beachtown to turn in my thesis and hang out with friends becomes one of the best weekends ever. It was Place-under-glass good. It was Awareness-that-this-is-a-golden-memory-in-the-making good, the way only fleeting moments can be. Moments lived under the weight of awareness of their finite nature. That we know we can’t keep.
During a Saturday morning sunny drive to the beach, a friend and I listened to Smog. Smog, as you may or may not know, is the alias of musician Bill Callahan, a man whom I’ve long assumed, from the sound of his seasoned voice and wise old lyrics, to be a creepily handsome but weathered old man, in the tradition of the Devil character from Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? I recently found out that he is not; this was disappointing. Rather than a figure of fable, he’s like, a completely normal thirtysomething dude who’s bedded both Joanna Newsom and Chan Marshall. (And yes, I am aware that the word “bedded” makes everything sound worse and makes me sound like a writer from freaking Star magazine.)
The album A River Ain’t Too Much to Love is so beautiful, I feel kind of unworthy to listen to it and claim it for my own, and then I realized that this is precisely why I never listen to it. Even though I’ve had it for several years, my one wish with this album is for it always to feel happened-upon and new. I don’t want to learn all the words. There is so much lurvely music out there in the world, and I fill as many free spaces as possible with it. But something about this album. It’s so good that I harbor this sneaking suspicion that it’s too good for me. That it’s too good for the rest of my records, even. That it will raise the bar and wreck the happy equilibrium I’ve cultivated in my current community of cds.
Basically, there’s a concern concerning balance, Henshaw. There’s a fear of seesaws. Luckily, on this geographical end there is Marshall, who is pretty damn heavy in terms of import, and at least one amazing friend here (you know who you are, Missy-sitting-next-to-me), too, but I’ve gotta shake a leg and I dunno, where to go with this metaphor? Toss some gold ingots down over here. I am looking forward to the day when contentedness is not accompanied by some necessary “Carpe diem” sting. Does this happen? I have created a bad, bad precedent of not staying anywhere long enough to find out.
Labels: music, nostalgialand, travelin'
posted by Alice at 9:42 AM
1 Comments:
You're right. That album is too good. It's transporting. It's mellifluous. "Drinking at the Dam" moves me so.
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