“Glorious, Glorious”

I was going to hold off and just review the whole new The Joiners album closer to its release date, but I started crying and laughing on my way home from work, listening to their song, “Glorious, Glorious” and I burst in the back door and I said to the Butcher, “Listen to this,” and I put it through the big speakers and he said, “Oh yeah, I like this song. I’ve heard it on Lightning 100. Todd Snider, right? No, wait…”

“No, wait, right? You haven’t heard it.”

And he brushed his teeth in time to the music and the dog and I danced around the living room and I thought, shoot, this is as good as anything else in my iPod and better than much of it.

And, it manages to be the kind of song you hurry home to dance around the house to while also being a song about coming to Nashville and being a singer, and, by this point in history, it should be said that making a good song about coming to Nashville and being a singer is doubly hard because it’s so cliched. I mean, it’s not off-limits to paint a picture of a guy standing next to his wife/daughter, looking all solemn and Iowan, but, if you’re going to do it, you’d better nail it.

I think The Joiners nail it.

And, my god, there’s such nice stuff going on through the song. It starts out with family-style harmonies, it’s got a nice churchy piano, a rockin’ electric guitar, an organ at the end, an acoustic guitar… and that’s just what I can hear on this crappy computer. It’s like they put every musical experience a regular person might have put her hands on in real life and been inspired by into a room just to see where it might lead.

And then, there’s even the 70s/80s style a cappella break towards the end, where everyone in the whole joint can sing along.

If you don’t listen to the words, it is the most rambunctious, joyous song about everything that is good about Nashville.

If you do listen to the words, well, it’s a really happy song about some very, very tough times–“if you like what you hear, buy me something to eat.”

And there are some really great lyrical moments, for example “so softly landing/ a kiss on my face. / She liked the feeling. / I loved the taste.” The dude Joiner has this really lovely delivery on those words, like each word just needs to be cracked open a little bit so it can fill up with sound, and just before it spills over, he slips onto the next word. I don’t quite know how to explain it, but it’s like there’s this tension “We’re having so much fun singing this syllable that we don’t want it to end, but we also can’t wait to get to the next syllable, because it will be just as delightful.”

In a just world, you’d hear this song on the radio. You’d hear it start and you’d roll down your windows and you’d turn the radio way up and you’d sing along and, when it ended, you’d wish you could hear it again, one more time, right away.

Bits and Pieces

—Liz has a good story about a documentary about Bells Bend.

—I saw this the other day and thought, “someone should take a picture.” Well, just call me psychic blogger! Someday that’s going to be an exit from 40 onto Briley, but right now, it looks like a beautiful piece of public art that you drive under. An inconvenient piece of art, but a piece of art.

—You just knew this was coming. Yes, I’m sure posting people’s pictures around their neighborhoods will be a great deterrent. And, whoa boy, I can’t wait for the first time some kid is misidentified as a gang member by the city and ends up getting killed over it. That would be great fun.

Fuck it. Being afraid is not the answer. It should be deeply insulting to any Nashville that anyone in our community has to be afraid of these guys. And it is even more deeply insulting to suggest that the solution is for more of us to be even more afraid. And by all of us being afraid, frankly, it belittles the legitimate fear some folks have, and makes it harder to assess the danger and deal with it.

Buck up, Nashville.

–I don’t know how many of you saw this, but I thought it was pretty funny. UNTIL the guy who sent it to me was brave enough to admit that he wasn’t really sure how this stuff worked. He shouldn’t feel bad. After all, David Fowler still wants to force doctors who provide abortions to tell you they’re giving you an ultrasound because he doesn’t know about vaginal ultrasounds. And, well, it’s women’s history month and rather than me spending the month kicking people who say “herstory” in the shins, I thought it might be nice to do some straight up girly-parts educating, even get Rachel involved (surprise, Rachel!), because, while I rock the willingness to talk frankly about this stuff, she rocks the actual medical knowledge.

Don’t be embarrassed, people. I was way into my mid-20s before I learned that an uncircumcised penis basically had a little turtleneck of flesh and not some kind of little flap over the urethral opening.

We all have stupid ass ideas.

So, if you have questions, feel free to ask. If you need to do it anonymously, feel free to do so in the comments.

Another Park Post

This time, the Professor came with me. The Butcher has asked that, in the future, I refrain from taunting powerful gangs, but I said, “I would tease anyone else.” and he said, “but anyone else isn’t bound to be armed.”

And I waited.

And I waited.

And then he said, “Okay, but still. Don’t tease gangs.”

Exador Has Some Concerns, Which I Will Work to Aleviate

The only Irish thing I’d do on St. Patrick’s Day is back with his wife, so don’t you worry your pretty little head over it. I’ll be behaving.