William Fitzsimmons at The Firebird

Saturday I was lucky enough to see William Fitzsimmons play with Denison Witmer at the Firebird. This was the last show of their current tour, and they were slaphappy in the nicest possible way.

I feel like I’ve been spoiled with awesome live music this year. I haven’t been to a ton of shows (or wanted to be) but the shows I have seen (Rasputina, Griffin House, William Fitzsimmons) have been so amazing both musically and in the fabulous natures of the performers. Each of these shows has been as intimate and amusing as it has been musically delicious, and they’ve all really given me that feeling of – damn, glad I saw this live. There is such a difference between seeing a band perform live and seeing an entertainer on stage – and these shows all featured entertainers.

Saturday’s show was lovely. For the most part the crowd was great. Both performers mentioned how much they loved performing in St. Louis, and how the crowds here are always really good to them. I felt that everyone really understood and respected the type of music we were hearing, and at times the entire crowd stood in complete silence, concentrating on the stage. That said, I am still not a fan of the Firebird. Especially for a show like this, which is a sitting show if ever there was one. The sound was good, but standing for two hours staring at a stage without moving is just uncomfortable on my old bones. Also, the floor at the Firebird was seriously disgusting. Twice I almost walked right out of my sandal, it was so sticky. And this was not the crowd that made it sticky, meaning it had not been mopped since the night before’s Axe Body Spray sponsored concert (no, I am serious) So yeah, that was gross. And their drinks are bad, and it was hot and they wouldn’t turn the fans on, and ugh. Firebird. Bleh. Old Rock House would have been a million times better venue for this show.

But anyway! Despite the location, the show was utterly lovely. WF has a wonderful self-deprecating humor on stage (Going to slow things down for you with this next one. I know, you didn’t think it was possible to slow it down. But I’ve been experimenting with negative beats per minute.) and is obviously musically, lyrically and vocally gifted. I think my favorite moment was when he pulled out his banjolele (it’s a thing! I looked it up later!) and just sang with it, simply and quietly. Everyone was utterly still, until we all started murmuring along as a group. Kinda transcendent, if you don’t mind me being sentimental about it.

I was really excited about this show, and it lived up to all the hype in my head. So glad I got a chance to see him perform.

SOTD – Over the Rhine “Daddy Untwisted”

are you my daddy
are you

I don’t wanna cut you up
drink you from a paper cup
I don’t wanna spit you out
or kick you in the shin
I don’t wanna knock you down
be your mother be a clown
I don’t wanna talk about
the shit you’re really in
I don’t wanna take a bow
no one’s clapping anyhow
I don’t wanna sneak around
and pray you’ll understand
I don’t wanna call your bluff
enough’s enough
I don’t wanna see you
chained up

are you my daddy
are you

I don’t wanna ruffle you
cut the deck and shuffle you
don’t wanna come to fisticuffs
or stick you with a pin
I don’t wanna argue
hurt your pride or make you blue
your tongue is forked and clearly
there are scales upon your skin
I don’t wanna help ice crack
give you a surprise attack
I don’t wanna cut you slack
and watch it go to hell
I don’t wanna tell you lies
like presbyterians or spies
I don’t wanna see you chained up

are you my daddy
are you

don’t you run away
leave me like a rainy day
I don’t wanna make you stay
or stand up high above you
don’t want you to see me cry
I’m just trying not to lie
I don’t wanna see you chained up

Bat For Lashes – Daniel

Have I mentioned how much I love this song? I should have mentioned that before now.

What 2011 Sounded Like in My World

Oh 2011. What a year you’ve been. Such awful lows, such joyous joys. Such contentment, finally found. So many new things to worry about. The realization that we all just slide from crisis to crisis, all our lives, and it’s the quiet spaces in between that we must recognize and enjoy. Recognizing and enjoying those spaces, finally. In looking at this list, this year was a little sad, a little angry, and hell of a lot of determined.

I know all my music wasn’t captured in 2011, because I synced my iPod less, and when I did the sheer volume of songs was too much for the last.fm scrobbler, I think. So I have adjusted this list (unfairly weighted toward F+TM and against the Decemberists) to reflect what the year really sounded like. So, according to last.fm and my own memory, these were the most-played songs in my world in 2011. (You can play most of these songs if you right-click and open them in a new tab. But also please buy them and support these artists. Because they do amazing things.)

1. Imogen Heap –Wait It Out This is one of those songs that you find when you’re in that particular place that no one, ever, could possibly understand. Not even with the gentlest or most emphatic of explanations, you’re alone in this feeling forever. And then there’s a song, and that song is exactly what you feel, and suddenly the world is not so foreign-seeming. It’s about waiting for things to feel right again, and how sometimes all the things you have feel meaningless when they’re not the thing you want. Fave Lyric: Everybody says that times heals everything. But what of the wretched hollow? The endless in-between?
2. Florence + the Machine – No Light, No Light This year there was a new F+TM album. I didn’t think I could love it as much as the last one. I love it just as much, maybe more in some ways. She has the most spectacular, delicious pain. It’s like she’s doing you a favor by feeling it for you. Fave Lyric: You can’t choose what stays and what fades away.
3. William Fitzsimmons – I Don’t Feel It Anymore I’ve loved this song for a few years now, but this year it found its way onto all my playlists. It’s about things ending, and the ending being right, and it hurting anyway. Also, he’s coming to the Firebird in the spring, and if you’re in StL you should go. Fave Lyric: I want back the years that you took when I was young.
4. Florence + the Machine – Shake It Out This is a song about being happy anyway. Learning to be happy as a grim, determined, joyful choice. Fave Lyric: It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back, so shake him off. Also: I am done with my graceless heart, so tonight I’m gonna cut it out and then restart.
5. Griffin House – Better Than Love Sometimes you just want a love song, don’t you? A reminder that once in the world someone loved someone else, and it lasted at least as long as it took to write and record a song. It’s all well and good to recognize pain, but sometimes you have to recognize gentleness and beauty, too, even if you don’t really believe in it. Fave Lyric: You turned my life around. You made it okay to let you down.
6. The Decemberists – Down By The Water I don’t actually remember listening to this song that much, but I think I must have done it just because I love the way my voice sounds on that first “down by the water” line. Growly and real. I don’t know, it’s just not fucking around, this song. It’s straightforward. Maybe I needed that. And the way those words rub together, they’re amazing.
7. The Decemberists –Don’t Carry It All This is a song about community, and being a decent fucking human among other decent fucking humans. Another thing for which I hungered this year. Fave Lyric: So raise a glass to turnings of the season. And watch it as it arcs towards the sun. And you must bear your neighbor’s burden within reason. And your labors will be borne when all is done
8. Florence + the Machine – What The Water Gave Me Big and hollow and beautiful. All Virginia Woolf and the peace of giving up, and what you find in that place. Morbid, if you think if it that way. Which I don’t. Fave Lyric: And oh poor Atlas, it was a beast of a burden.
9. Griffin House –The Guy That Says Goodbye To You Again, Griffin House has these beautiful love songs. I thought this one was pretty and well written, but when I went to see him in Nashville and he played this, I straight up bawled like a calf. I guess sometimes we all really need to hear that we’re amazing and we’re worthy of love, and just because someone else doesn’t think so doesn’t mean they’re right.
10. The Decemberists – Won’t Want for Love – This is some intense rock ballad kick ass voice cracking joy driving music right here. The things I can make my voice do along with this song give me endorphin rushes. Fave Lyric: And I may swoon from all this swelling, but I won’t want for love.
11. Laura Veirs – Wide-Eyed, Legless I fell in love with this song in the spring and never stopped listening to it. To me this song is about being alone and being clear-eyed. But there are so many other layers here, of nostalgia and just plain beautiful sound and skillfull use of words. Goddamn, listening to it again now and loving it again. Fave Lyric: No more looking back, looking back, looking back, faded epitaphs.
12. The Decemberists – Rise To Me This song takes all your uncertainty away. Everything is forever, and it’s all going to be okay. Fave Lyric: I am gonna stand my ground. You rise to me and I’ll blow you down.
13. The Ting Tings – We Walk The Ting Tings. So happy! So necessary this year. This song is about running your own shit and making your own options. Fave Lyric: We got the choice if it all goes wrong. We walk.
14. The Decemberists – Calamity Song This song is like the Decemberists in disguise as REM back when I loved REM. This song is all happy nonsense and driving around and I just like to listen to it.
15. The Decemberists – Dear Avery This song is about reaching out to someone who doesn’t necessarily want to be reached out to. Maybe it’s also about reaching out to yourself. Sweet and sad. Fave Lyric: There are times life will rattle your bones and will bend your limbs.
16. Florence + the Machine – Lover To Lover This song is about trying to find yourself, or find something else, or maybe not even knowing what the fuck you’re looking for. And that being okay, since the journey is the thing. It always reminds me of my friend Kristen. Kristen you should buy this album. Have you bought this album?
17. Dr. Dre – Let Me Ride I went through a phase this summer in which I would only listen to Dr. Dre. Sometimes you’re just pissed off, you know?
18. Jim Croce –One Less Set Of Footsteps I rediscovered this album this fall. So many memories here, I always listened to this as a child with my mom. Love this whole greatest hits album, and this song in particular. This one is about taking the fuck off, and by the way, fuck you. When I was young I never understood the line about the jeans on the door. Like, who hung their jeans on the door? And really, still. Who hangs their jeans on the door? Anyway. Fave Lyric: If that’s the way that you want it, well it’s the way I want it more.
19. Tom T. Hall –That’s How I Got To Memphis So sad. This song is so sad. And hopeful. And also sad. Goddamn I love Tom T. Hall. So much. That line at the beginning “If you love somebody enough…” Indeed. If you do.
20. Themselves – Good People Check This is another one I listened to a lot this summer. Angry, fuck you music. About people who are full of crap. Fave Lyric: You can tell a lot about a man from the sound of his music. Yours is hollow sounding.

Those are the top 20, and here are a few I couldn’t leave out.

Jeremy Messersmith Dead End Job. Just pure heartbreak about doing anything you can for someone who won’t do shit for you. If you’re not listening to Jeremy Messersmith, you really should be.

Public Image Limited – The Order of Death. A good reminder, always, of the difference between what you want and what you end up with. And that you’re by far not the only person that’s happened to. So be angry, but get over it.

And that’s it! That’s what 2011 sounded like, here in my world.  A good year. Well done, music. You got me through like you always do.

One Less Set of Footsteps

Trying to rip more of my music to my harddrive, since space is really not a consideration anymore. Can’t believe I have not ripped this album before. Goddamn I love me some Jim Croce. I think he’s wrapped up in all my happiest memories of my mom and spending time with her when I was a kid. Today has been all happy music. That’s a good day.

If that’s the way that you want it, well that’s the way I want it more.

October Project – Funeral in His Heart

There is a lyric in this song that’s been stuck in my head for a while now.

“It was someone else ago.”

In many ways our lives can be defined by the significant people in them, and as they change, we change. “Someone else ago” is as good a marker for lost times as any, and a more evocative way to delineate our past than most.

October Project – Funeral in His Heart

He had a dream
It was haunting him at night
It would fly into his hands
So he tried to cage it
But he only made it fly away

He heard a song
It was running through his mind
It was singing from the past
So he tried to sing it
But he found he could not make it last

The world is falling apart
He’s getting older
And there’s a funeral in his heart

He was alone
With a picture of his life
On the outside looking in
So he tried to change it
But he lost the person he had been

The world is falling apart
He’s getting older
And there’s a funeral in his heart

Thunder moving under the mountain
Thunder in his dreams
Hoping that there must be a word for
Everything he means

He had a love
It was keeping him alive
It was someone else ago
So he tried to hide it
But he knew he’d never let it go

The world is falling apart
He’s getting older
And there’s a funeral in his heart

Rasputina – Watch T.V.

Rasputina – Watch T.V.

I’m the lucky one
Always having fun
I tie back my hair
I sit and watch T.V.
I see only me
Though I look for you there

Oh, where have you gone?
Were you canceled?
I change to channel 2
You were the one
Who gave me all my answers
I changed
So did you

Try another show
With the volume low
I make up what they say
What used to be your face
Is an empty space
Your co-stars look away

Oh, where have you gone
And do you miss me
And what we used to do?
You were the one
Who’d talk and smile for half an hour
Always new

I’m the lucky one
I watch a re-run.
It looks a lot like you

One star lost a family
One family lost a star
That’s why I wait and watch
To find out where you are

One family lost a star
One star, they lost their family
That’s why I sit at home alone
And watch T.V.

I can watch forever
I can watch for hours
It just gets better
It gives me power
I can watch for hours
I can watch forever
It gives me pleasures
It makes me better

I’m the lucky one.
Always having fun.

Tom T. Hall – That’s How I Got to Memphis

It’s been super-musical-nostalgia (and margarita!) weekend. Enjoy.

Laura Veirs – Galaxies

This morning I had the most beautiful drive to work. It was not cool out, by any means, but unwarm enough that I could have the windows down and the sunroof open. The crepe myrtles are in bloom all over this city and they are stunning. I got to drive through the park listening to this song* on repeat and letting the sun shine in my eyes.

It makes me feel sadly nostalgic, there’s definitely something bittersweet here. But there are worse ways to start the day, I do believe.

Laura Veirs – Galaxies

When you sing, when you sing
The stars fill up my eyes
Galaxies pour down my cheeks
Galaxies they flood the street
Galaxies

When we dance, when we dance
Eels and sea grass float on by
I’m 10,000 leagues beneath the sea
10,000 leaguesbeneath the green
10,000 leagues

When we kiss, when we kiss
Bears and boulders vibrate through the air
Gravity is dead you see
No gravity all I need is beating red
No gravity

I want to lay out in the pool, on a raft, listening to this while I think about nothing.

Then I want to really listen to it, and get a chill.

Laura Veirs – Sun is King

even the most shimmering rain
empties out the sky and comes to an end
we all know that the sun is king
there’s no messing with our orbiting

so why is he standing in his own backyard
crying at his fallen-down house of card?

did you see the ice in his eye?
did you see the dagger caught in his smile?
innocent as a summer flower
with a serpent coiled under his collar

so why is he standing in his own backyard
crying at his fallen-down house of card?

All I Need is Everything – Over the Rhine

This song. So stuck in my head.

All I Need is Everything – Over the Rhine

Slow down. Hold still.
It’s not as if it’s a matter of will.
Someone’s circling. Someone’s moving
a little lower than the angels.
And it’s got nothing to do with me.
The wind blows through the trees,
but if I look for it, it won’t come.
I tense up. My mind goes numb.
There’s nothing harder than learning how to receive.

Calm down. Be still.
We’ve got plenty of time to kill.
No hand writing on the wall:
just the voice that’s in us all.
And you’re whispering to me,
time to get up off my hands and knees,
’cause if I beg for it, it won’t come.
I find nothing but table crumbs.
My hands are empty. God I’ve been naive.

All I need is everything.
Inside, outside, feel new skin.
All I need is everything.
Feel the slip and the grip of grace again.

Slow down. Hold still.
It’s not as if it’s a matter of will.
Someone’s circling. Someone’s moving
a little lower than the angels.
This voice calling me to you:
it’s just barely coming through.
Still, I clearly hear my name.
I’ve been fingering the flame
like tomorrow’s martyr.
It gets harder to believe.

All I need is everything.
Inside, outside, feel new skin.
All I need is everything.
Feel the slip and the grip of grace again.

So from now till kingdom come,
taste the words on the tip of my tongue.
‘Cause we can’t run truth out of town,
only force it underground.
The roots grow deeper
in ways we can’t conceive.

All I need is everything.
Inside, outside feel new skin.
All I need is everything.
Feel the slip and the grip of grace again.

All I need is all I need.

Jem – Just a Ride

This might be a repeat SOTD, I am too lazy to look and see. Regardless, it’s worth a happy pants repeat listen.

Jeremy Messersmith – Dead End Job

I fucking love this guy, even though he makes me kind of want to die.

Jeremy Messersmith – Dead End Job

Trying hard to stay awake
Overtime without a break
I’ll catch the night bus home
You won’t have to sleep alone
I wear this crisp white shirt for you
I work this dead end job for you

My guitar’s out in the shed
But I will stumble into bed
Time will break these hands
Two kids one minivan
I bought that diamond ring for you
I’d buy anything for you

From the dark side of the street
I hung around to watch him leave
And I watched him kiss your neck
So soft and violent
But I won’t say a word to you

I would lose my pride for you
I’d lose everything for you…

The Order of Death – Public Image Limited

Deb Talan – Comfort

Anyone who’s read my blog for any length of time knows of my love for The Weepies. But depending on my mood I also get really into the solo work of both the artists in the band, Steve Tannen and Deb Talan. These past few days have been very Imogen Heap and Deb Talan oriented. Not a lot of Deb’s solo stuff is floating around YouTube, but I found a copy of “Comfort” there. So lovely. Honestly, you should buy everything she’s ever released. Just do it. She’s amazing. The Weepies too, obviously. But honestly you should hear the solo stuff to better understand the band. Anyway.

Deb Talan – Comfort

When everyone has gone to sleep and you are wide awake
there’s no one left to tell your troubles to.
Just an hour ago, you listened to their voices
lilting like a river over underground
and the light from downstairs came up soft like daybreak
dimly as the heartache of a lonely child.

If you can’t remember a better time
you can have mine, little one.
In days to come when your heart feels undone
may you always find an open hand
and take comfort wherever you can.

And oh, it’s a strange place.
And oh, everyone with a different face
but just like you thought when you stopped here to linger
we’re only as separate as your little fingers.

So cry, why not? We all do.
then turn to one you love
and smile a smile that lights up all the room.
Follow your dreams in through every out-door
it seems that’s what we’re here for.

And when you can’t remember a better time
you can have mine, little one.
In days to come when your heart feels undone
may you always find an open hand
and take comfort, there is comfort.
Take comfort wherever you can, you can, you can…