Weeknotes: March 3-7, 2025
Monday March 3
I'm on Spring Break. The last time that happened was 1997, by which time I'd already been a college dropout for a year. I joined a group of friends on a weeklong trip to Hilton Head, South Carolina where we drank impressively and agitated the local retiree populace as only drunken youth can.
This year, my friend Serge invited me on a weekend road trip to Newport, Kentucky to see Robyn Hitchcock at Southgate House Revival. It’s the successor to the late Southgate House, a grand old pile that for decades served as a staple of the indie rock touring circuit until its abrupt closure in 2011. GLMS played a show there sometime in the mid-2000s, though my memories of it are hazy. We opened for an Oregon band called the Stars of Track and Field in the tavern room and played mostly to the staff. We might have caught a couple strays who wandered in for a beer, but neither band had any fans there. Somewhere there's a photo of me in one of my occasional touring moustaches posing next to an oil portrait of some colonial chap who may or may not have been the manor's original inhabitant.
The revival occupies an old church just a few blocks away and carries some of the original’s historic gravitas, even if it feels like a work in progress. But, a santuary seems like a good fit, especially for Hitchcock who was in top form. His set consisted almost entirely of requests, a detail I didn't learn about until I overheard his partner, Emma Swift, asking fans at the merch booth if there was anything they'd like to hear. I can hardly remember the songs I've just practiced, let alone dredge up curios from the distant past; this gig would be my nightmare. In fact, I've probably had this nightmare. But Robyn was game, and as a result I got to hear songs I never thought I'd hear live, foremost among them the timely "Don't Talk To Me About Gene Hackman," a cut so deep it was the second of two unlisted secret tracks buried at the end 1999's Jewels For Sophia. He closed with the Soft Boys gem “Queen of Eyes,” a song I’ve included in my own set many times. As an encore, he unplugged his guitar and paced around the congregation leading a sing-along of the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life.” My kind of sermon.
The next day we drove an hour east to see the great Serpent Mound, a 1,348-feet-long effigy built thousands of years ago, probably by the Adena culture. The gates were closed when we arrived, so we took our chances and trespassed on foot. Relative to this country's size, America has preserved so few of these ancient earthworks. Past a small visitor center and rickety observation tower (closed for repairs) the curving burial mound stretched serenely out of view, bordered by a paved footpath. With no one else around, it seemed especially peaceful and we grokked it with reverence for its prehistoric creators and apologies to its present-day stewards, the Ohio History Connection.
Weeknotes: February 24-28, 2025
Monday February 24
I spend the morning listening to Robyn Hitckcock's Eye. I think it’s one of his solo benchmarks and it prompted in me an early appreciation for the merits of an acoustic album. I'm going to Kentucky to hear him play this weekend. I've seen him four other times, but it's been a while. There are few other artists whose careers I've consistently followed and admired for so long.
When I was 15 my brother took me to see Hitchcock with his erstwhile band the Egyptians in Royal Oak. They were at their brief commercial apex, having just stumbled into a minor hit with "So You Think You're in Love" from Perspex Island, an album that, until recently has remained "out of print" in the streaming world. It's not his best (Queen Elvis is my favorite), but it's the point where my adolescent self arrived in his career. I had just begun to pay attention to album credits and I remember noting the producer's name, Paul Fox; he had produced XTC's Oranges & Lemons two years prior. His name came across my radar again in the mid-'90s, helming Semisonic's first LP.
The Egyptians show we saw was in February 1992 and afterward we waited out in the cold behind the theater to ask Robyn for an autograph, which he graciously, if somewhat obscurely, gave. In black marker he inscribed on my ticket stub a capital R with a circle around it. It's still tucked under the CD tray of my copy of Element of Light.
Today, the sun is shining and the snow is melting in rivulets down both sides of the street. I listen to a grim Icelandic detective novel on my headphones. As we walk, Islay insists on hitting every snowbank, examining the dense neighborhood thaw. In the muddy driveway she stands for minutes on end, head cocked, nose gently twitching. Spring must be intense for a dog; such olfactory abundance.
In the evening CC and I rehearse a new song. Between illness, work, and school, I've been playing less often than I'd like and the act of harmonizing with another person feels especially welcome. I expect us to sound a little rusty, but we've played together for long enough now that it all comes together rather quickly.
Weeknotes: February 17-20, 2025
Monday February 17
Composing for hire remains a novel pursuit for me. I enjoy the challenge, but do it so rarely that I have to fight against my deep-rooted tendencies. I tend to overcomplicate things. Even when I'm writing instrumental music, I'm thinking about the overall structure and pacing of the arrangement, treating it more like a song than the mood-setting backdrop it sometimes needs to be. This piece I'm currently working on should flow unobtrusively behind a voice-over, but I'm struggling to keep it simple.
Repetition with very subtle dynamic shifts is what's called for, but I keep inserting rests, a bridge, and dynamic dips and swells. The first version I submitted had all those things and when I watched the rough cut, I was a little embarrassed; the piece itself is nice, but the extra parts felt obtrusive and showy. I then tried a version with a shorter rest and truncated bridge and it played a little better on the fine cut, but still wasn't right.
This morning I spend a couple hours on an edit that removes all chord changes outside the primary loop, but still has a sort of "bridge" moment about two-thirds of the way through. Why don’t I have it in me to kill that bridge? It’s not a pop song.
Weeknotes: February 10-14, 2025
Weeknotes: January 27-31, 2025
Monday January 27
Over the weekend I shot over 100 photos in multiple locations with the borrowed Canon, but forgot to change the settings to RAW. None will be usable for our first class project. My first lesson learned. This evening the light is similar and I head out at the same hour to try and recreate some of my favorite shots, knowing it's a fool's errand. Of course, yesterday's magic is nowhere to be found, but today's magic gathers around me the longer I look.
Weeknotes: January 20-24, 2025
Monday January 20
When he received the Nobel Peace Prize, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said this:
"I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.”
Weeknotes: January 13-17, 2025
Monday January 13
My limbs trundle reluctantly up the hill past the south edge of campus, the wind biting my bare face. The first half mile is accomplished by will alone, but it gets better. I gauge my footfalls gingerly over the ice patches and head down the ginnel that connects College Place with Pearl. By the time I cross onto Spring Street, my body feels relaxed and lithe. At Waterworks Park a woman stands over the hood of her blue minivan arranging loaves of supermarket bread to feed to the assemblage of ducks and geese closing in around her.
I think of my mom, a lifetime nurturer of urban waterfowl populations. I picture her tiny figure holding up a bag of hamburger buns to feed the squawking gulls. For a brief time she and I kept up a Christmas Eve tradition of emptying a large bag of cracked corn on the grass by the Brighton Mill Pond, a gift to the cold feathered peasantry. Even now when I go to visit my parents, she is constantly managing a half dozen feeding stations. Just yesterday I caught her scattering seed on the front porch for her favorite possum and then on a metal table out behind the kitchen for her resident doves. She loves her doves. My parents have always had big hearts for wild things.
Weeknotes: January 6-10, 2025
Monday January 6
Outside the giant home decor superstore shreds of yellow caution tape flap like pennants, suggesting unknown drama. Scant cars punctuate the desolate parking lot. Grim is the word that comes to mind. In Chris Frantz's Talking Heads memoir (which I've stuck with, and am now enjoying) he recalls how Johnny Ramone used that word over and over to describe their shared 1977 tour of Europe ("Oh shit, man, this is gonna be grim").
I don't go to this store very often. It's one of those wastelands of excess that makes me feel edgy and cynical. It's like a blander Pier 1 without any curation, a shelter for the world’s decorative vases and wicker plant stands to live out their days in a heady fug of candle store aroma. I'm in the market for new bathroom rugs that will pair well with the tricky seafoam walls and faux driftwood floor covering I inherited when I rented the house. Last winter I spontaneously bought a complete set of grass green rugs and matching towels which I pretended to like for a couple days before recognizing I'd turned my bathroom into a 1980s Holiday Inn. January is when I'm most inclined to tackle these problems. Aren't we all working on our interiors this time of year?
Weeknotes: December 30, 2024 - January 3, 2025
Monday December 30
The sun returns after several days of drear and what a difference it makes. I visit my parents and eat chili seasoned with brown sugar. My mom puts brown sugar in everything, a secret ingredient of her long happy life. My dad and I work down in the woodshop cutting and sanding some lumber for a couple home improvement projects I hope to complete before my vacation ends. Last night I saw the Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, and was unexpectedly moved by it. It made me think of my parents and I urge them to go see it while it's in theaters.
I've had a lifelong respect for Dylan, but he's never really been my guy. I’ve owned various records, sung his songs, watched documentaries, and even read his memoir. I've flirted with "going through a Dylan phase" many times in my life, but it just never quite clicks. I didn't really have any expectations for Timothée Chalamet; my only reference was the recent Dune movies, but I've seen David Lynch's version so many times, it's hard for me to accept anyone but Kyle MacLachlan as my Paul Atreides.
Anyway, I loved the movie and was won over by Chalamet. I think biopics are always more successful when they set limitations and examine a specific era of a subject's life. The Greenwich Village folk scene of the early-'60s has always held an allure for me. Although they grew up in Chicago, my parents were the perfect age for that time. Together since they were 16, they graduated high school in 1963 and loved music more than anything. They were bopping around the clubs and coffeehouses of Chicago, steeping in the cultural abundance of that era during their late-teens. How lucky for them. I loved my teendom in the mid-'90s, but if there were another era I could be young in, I bet I would have thrived in that one. I'll just have to try and thrive in the present, a worthy goal for 2025.
Best of 2024
I enjoy the self-reflective tone of the year’s end. I spend some time taking stock, reviewing my past goals, looking at what went well, what went poorly, what surprised me, how much I changed, where I traveled, who I met, what I made, and other observations that left some kind of imprint on me. All of this helps me move into the new year with a certain measure of confidence and optimism. Assembled here is a Top 40 of personal highlights, ranked in no particular order.
Weeknotes: December 16-20, 2024
I guess I felt like writing this week. Happy Solstice!
Monday, December 16
My Christmas lights shine weakly against the gloom. After such a crisp start, December has retreated into rainy drear. At the supermarket I stand in the baking aisle looking for cardamom pods. The woman next to me is coming up short in her own spice search and we exchange friendly smalltalk about holiday busyness. A few minutes later she finds me in the next aisle waving in victory a small jar of ground cardamom. Such a sweet gesture, but I really want the pods. I thank her anyway.
After work I head back out into the drizzle on a longer set of evening errands. Just over a week until Christmas, but I'm thwarted on most of my stops. I do find the cardamom, though. I walk around Ann Arbor feeling dispirited, carrying only one of the several gifts I'd sought. I catch the last ten minutes of happy hour at Conor O'Neill's. I remember when this Irish bar opened in the late-'90s. It felt like an overly-commercial upstart on Main Street, but tonight I'm drawn to its well-established and unpretentious vibe. Some type of Harry Potter party must have recently happened; there are "Wanted" posters for Fenrir Greyback and "I solemnly swear I am up to no good" signs are tacked over several booths. I work on a pint of Smithwick's and write in my notebook, replenishing my cheer sip by sip.
A father with his young son approaches the bar asking if the North Pole mailbox has been taken down. The boy has a letter for Santa. The bartender disappears for a bit, then comes back to confirm said box is presently in the store room being prepped for delivery to the North Pole. He accepts the envelope on Santa's behalf, and moves off stage with a smile, ferrying away the kid’s hopes and dreams.
Year in Review: Music
I think Weeknotes might go on vacation for a little bit while I enjoy some holiday downtime. But it’s the end of the year and I do love a good wrap-up list. Featured below are a handful of records I had the privilege of reviewing in 2024 along with some I love, but didn’t review. I’ve included links to my AllMusic reviews along with buying/streaming links to support these artists.
Weeknotes: December 2-6, 2024
A condensed edition this week. Yet again, I’ve borrowed a format idea from my hero, Walknotes (thank you, Denise!).
STRAY THOUGHTS & OBSERVATIONS
I take Islay to the pet store to have her nails trimmed by a professional. She trembles, but tolerates it, giving me a wounded look through the grooming salon window. Afterward, I reward her with a walk at County Farm Park. We're behind a Ford Escape with the shaft of its rear wiper missing. I don't think the driver realizes it's on. Its little black stump wags back and forth every few seconds like a shy, sweet dog.
Weeknotes: November 25-29, 2024
It’s the start of the holidays. I’ll likely take a break from Weeknotes sometime in the next month, but for now, here’s a little Thanksgiving four-parter and some notes on the joy of running.
Monday, November 25
PART 1: I hang my evergreen wreath on the high eave of the porch. No ladder needed; I balance its fulcrum on the tip of my walking stick which I keep in a blue bucket next to the coat rack, and gently lift it up to the waiting nail placed there three years ago.
Weeknotes: November 18-22, 2024
Monday, November 18
It's mid-afternoon and I'm standing at the end of my block with Islay who is examining a hedge. Across the street a band loads out of an upstairs apartment. The first guy has a freshly-sculpted mohawk and a guitar case and is followed single file by two mismatched bandmates with amps and drum gear.
At work we are assembling our year-end lists, both for the company and as individual editors. I have some focused listening to do. At dusk I head out on foot and find myself wandering though Highland Cemetery, listening to Arooj Aftab's Night Reign on my headphones. It's a good cemetery album, more seductive than spooky. As night falls, I see a woman walking a dog in my direction down the dark wooded lane and turn around so as not to scare her. On my way out I pause at the gate which is eerily lit by a high purple streetlight. Now I'm listening to the Shovel Dance Collective, a U.K. folk group who sound a bit like Ireland's Lankum. Their slow, brooding version of the old maritime ballad "The Merry Golden Tree" is a bit of a masterpiece. I love these new dark trad bands.
Weeknotes: November 11-15, 2024
On WCBN the DJ plays four Alvvays songs in a row. I think about driving to Cleveland with Serge this past spring to see them play the Agora Ballroom. We had a fun night. Ever since, I've wanted to title a song "Alvvays in Cleveland." My brother and his girlfriend went to Cleveland a couple weeks ago to see the Mongolian folk metal band the Hu and visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for the first time. I told him to give my regards to Colin Blunstone's sweater. He sent me a picture with the caption "I am changed."
Last Known Address
No Weeknotes this week. My heart wears the black armband of mourning, yet it’s for a tragedy shared by less than half of my country. I don’t really know how to process that, so that’s all I’m going to say for now. Instead, please allow me to direct you to something that brings me a great sense of pride.
Weeknotes: October 28 - November 1, 2024
Monday, October 28
I had a good hair day yesterday. Even better, I was at a party and friends witnessed it. You hate to waste a good hair day. Today, my second cup of coffee tastes like spring, though it's not even November yet. A lot of seasons still to cycle through. On WCBN it's clearly spooky season. Shriekback, Bauhaus, 45 Grave. It's a nice little commute and I pull into campus with Peter Murphy hurling Latin incantations out my windows.
Later I light a fire and start triaging which potted plants will come inside for the winter. Wearing leather work gloves, I use tweezers to carefully extract dead leaves that have blown into my mess of cacti. I like winterizing a yard, it's satisfying work. I say goodbye to RR who moves out Apt. 2 tomorrow, taking Pretzel with her. I've become very fond of that little three-legged cat.
Weeknotes: October 21-25, 2024
Monday, October 21
Battleground state fatigue. Two weeks unil the election and it's just a relentless slog of unwanted emails, texts, and TV ads. I listen to Death's classic debut Scream Bloody Gore over coffee and oatmeal. I hope it's not a harbinger of the violence we're all afraid will occur after November 5.
I remember when my brother first bought this album on cassette in the late-'80s. We were power metal guys (Iron Maiden, Helloween, Fate's Warning) and had never heard death metal. Jamie was already into punk and some thrash. He bought it because it seemed audacious and kind of funny. A band called Death with a bunch of skeletons in robes drinking wine on the cover. I was about ten or eleven and they were pretty heavy for me, but I was still rapt whenever he put them on. It was kind of scary and exciting, like when he gave me his Walkman and told me to go into the closet, turn off the lights, and listen to "In the Beginning" by Mötley Crüe. Shout at the Devil sounds lightweight now, but there was some great glam-Satanist theater to that intro that really tapped into the zeitgeist of the era.
I went to the John Williams pops concert over the weekend. I took my mom; we had a pub dinner then went to the symphony. Very classy. Honestly, it was one of the most transformative concerts I've seen in years. Even more than power metal, John Williams' film scores are the true music of my youth. They go straight into that special part of my soul where hope and green things live. My face hurt from smiling so hard and when I wasn't smiling I was crying, especially during the Superman march, Star Wars end credits, and E.T. theme. Damon Gupton was the guest conductor and proved to be an effective showman and emcee. Some of the players had costumes on; a few witch hats, a toy shark affixed to the top of the harp. We thought they were going to hold out and deny us the Raiders of the Lost Ark theme (we'd have gone all Scream Bloody Gore on them), but of course it was the encore. The joy of life was in that room.
Weeknotes: October 14-18, 2024
Monday, October 14
I feel behind on pumpkin-acquisition and other fall imperatives. Where are my decorative corn stalks and knobbly gourds? I still have hanging ferns and a potted geranium on the porch. It's going to be November in a couple weeks and I'll be removing the screens and cleaning the windows, one of my favorite pre-winter rituals, usually done after daylight savings ends.
Lunchtime is a failure. For the second day in a row I drive out to Liberty Station to check my P.O. box and do a quick photo shoot, and for the second day in a row I find the lobby closed, this time for Columbus Day. Since I'm downtown, I hit up two different running stores to try and replace my worn out shoes, but don't find what I want. It's a waste of a trip. I console myself with a new $3 gel pen from Literati's pen bar, then head back to Ypsilanti.