Fritz

Would love to do SBS again. Trekked it all the way from Australia last time but right now we can't leave our shores. I'm holding out against hope...

On first listen I am absolutely floored by this song. 

Stunning. Can't stop listening.

Nope (not too much to hope for). 

That's what I'm thinking!

I see that Bob Weir (with Dead & Co) is playing not too far away in Cancun and their four day festival - Playing in the Sand - finishes on 20th Jan. That gives him some time to make it down to Sky Blue Sky for a song or two on the last night...too much to hope for?

Road trip Friday afternoon. These albums were the perfect soundtrack...

I remember when Nick Cave released 'The Boatman's Call' way back when a friend of mine lamented that Nick was wasting the talent of the Bad Seeds. I kinda feel the same way about this one. Each song comes on and I'm hanging out to hear the BAND kick in, not just quiet arrangements of Jeff songs which happen to be played by these guys who are in Wilco. I'm two listens in and feeling just a little...underwhelmed. I loved 'Warm' and loved 'Warmer' even more but this one...I'm going to have to dive back in again and again to try and find it. Any other band and I wouldn't devote the time to it. But it's Wilco. They've earned it.

Nice setlist. A few differences there from Sydney.

Great music changes as we change. It stays with us no matter the circumstances and old meanings shed their skin to make way for newer ones. Sometimes this is painful, sometimes this is beautiful, yet all the time this fills me with awe. 

Tell me about this.

This is the second Modiano book I've read and I've only just begun this one this but it's quite beautiful. Dreams, memory, reality all intersect (already!) in this story about a nameless man who is searching the streets and neighborhoods of Paris for a woman he encounters in the first sentence of the book - when she knocks him down in her car. I'm finding I need a quiet space to sit with it and give the language its full due. When I do this I am quite transfixed by the writing. There are lines everywhere I want to scribble down in my notebook.

I came across Patrick Modiano's name in an interview with Patti Smith. I'll definitely be seeking out more of his work.

I agree with everything you said. It's so baffling to me why we're still a relatively small number of people, but I've come to accept that Jeff either resonates with you or he doesn't. If he doesn't, you're never going to get it. If you connect with his songs and his voice on some soul level, though, you're never going to get over it.

Amen. I feel lucky that we get to have him make music for us in our lifetime.

Both nicely said.

Oddly enough, I WAS expecting a low-key, comfortable-but-not-earthshaking revisit of several old friends (songs) and thus was completely blown away when I finally put it on late one night and got to have the experience of a living room show for only me, in my own living room. From Via Chicago on, I was captivated by the intimacy and sheer beauty of these melodies and these words. It felt all new to me.

 

It's a powerful album that will bring you back to when you first fell inside these songs. Listen without distractions. This is Jeff distilled to his essence.

This was pretty much my experience, too. We put it on most nights during the lull between evening homework and dinner. Being winter here (southern hemisphere) it plays as a beautiful soundtrack to the cold outside. It's just a beautiful record. I was thinking last night how the sequencing of every song is perfect. I can't recall which particular songs made me feel this. It'll come to me.

Time for another listen, though.

^^Yes, me too. Damn, it's a fine album.

I agree. Sometimes A Great Notion really hit me as a work of such pure yet complex genius.

Every 10 years or so I reread "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and every time I'm amazed at how wonderful a writer Kesey is. G'damn that man could really turn a phrase.

I second the Tascam DR-05 suggestion. I've owned this unit for a number of years now and it's great for recording up close guitar/vocal demos or full band rehearsals. When recording the full band, simply turn down the recording level so the audio doesn't peak. Easy to use and great sound for such a small unit.

^Agree with both sentences here.

Fawn is a great song. Wonderful arrangements.

Train of Love - Johnny Cash

but here's Bob's version...

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xlyl42_bob-dylan-train-of-love-1999_music

and this..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ijh42sc6P4E

This is such a cool gig story!

A couple of favorites...Bruce Springsteen in 1975, at UC Santa Barbara, and Elvis Costello at the Whiskey on the Sunset Strip....'77 or '78. There was an obnoxious drunk, a big guy, throwing himself all over, bashing into people in his snockered state. He was directly below Elvis, front and center at the stage edge. Midway through the show, tiny angry Elvis had had enough of him. Elvis bent and picked up the guy's tall drink glass which he'd set on the stage, and then Costello, all unruffled coolness, poured the whole drink over the drunk's head. The guy was so soused he just stood and took it in stunned, sputtery shock. Then a moment later he snorted like an enraged bull and lunged at the stage. Elvis gave him an unimpressed look, took a step back, and snapped the top half of the glass off against his mic stand, then held it out toward the drunk, white-knuckled and ready to take him on. I still have that image burned in my brain.

Security came from all corners at that, and hauled the fool out into the street. Elvis tossed the broken glass down and it rolled beneath the drumset and the show resumed. What a phenomenal show that was! I'm still surprised that at show's end, when I asked a roadie if he'd fetch me the glass, he shrugged and handed it to me! There was a second show that night, after ours, and I still remember emerging from the club onto Sunset, where a long excited line waited, carrying a broken half-glass and getting some very odd looks!

 

I still have that treasured little artifact!