Good morning.
I’m trying to gather momentum. It’s been hard to get into a rhythm the past month. We’ve had house guests, I caught the flu, we sat in totality during the eclipse, I ran a 10k, I got to see Rachel Bloom, Joe Pera, and The State perform live comedy and felt the draw of performing live comedy again, we house sat and pet sat for a week and lived with house painters at my fiance’s parents’s house.
It was hard to get into a rhythm writing and posting because I was living my life. And as much as it has been a challenge, I’ve started to get used to the fact that part of life is living life and not sitting alone and writing about it.
The weather in Austin in April has been beautiful. Everything is green and the mornings and evenings, out my window, have been remarkably peaceful. I’ve been thinking a lot about the word precarity and what it means—mainly inspired by Eula Biss’s Being and Being Had. I’m going to write something about that.
I think the best feeling I had this month was watching The State perform live at the Paramount Theater.
So much of my life has been spent enjoying the comedy of all of the performers in The State: sketches they’ve written, sketches they’ve acted in, movies they’ve written, movies they’ve acted in, web series they’ve created, podcasts they’ve been on. So much of the shared language I have with my college friends comes from the members of The State.
Before their show and between sketches, they showed images of The State during college at NYU and while they were doing their MTV Show. It made my heart hurt to see all of these college friends who were able to create and do so much together, get older together, fight and entertain people together.
At the end of the show, I watched as The State left the stage. I saw Ken Marino tap the bottom of the screen at the back of the stage. The State logo lingered on the screen and he stood there looking at it and holding one hand up. It all meant something. It all means something—even something as stupid as saying “I wanna dip my balls in it.”
I’m going through one of those phases where I’m not sure what I’m doing with my writing here or anywhere. It feels aimless and pointless. But I know those things come and go and regardless of what happens, it makes me happy. As I get older, that becomes a bit easier to accept.
Here’s a playlist of songs I listened to in April.
See you next time.
“Crowbar” by Waxahatchee
This is one of those breezy tunes that Waxahatchee is so good at. On the next warm day, turn this song on, roll your car window down or pull your apartment window up and stick your arm(s) out, and enjoy it. This song was April to me.
“Season Cycle” by XTC
For a band with a lot of songs that feel like spring, this is probably the springest song XTC recorded. I was listening to Skylarking (1986) a lot right when we moved down to Austin last year and this song and album are a nice marker of time for me.
“Secondary Modern” by Elvis Costello & The Attractions
I never forget about Elvis Costello but sometimes I just forget to listen to him. I’m starting to dip my toe back in a bit through my usual gateway drug—Armed Forces (1979). But this one from Get Happy (1980) might be my favorite Elvis Costello song of all time. I think in 2013 or 2014 I once sat in my studio apartment and drank beer and listened to this song for three hours straight.
“Synchronicity II” by The Police
One of the lingering images of my childhood is going to my great Aunt Gilda and great Uncle Jimmy’s house in New Jersey for their famous Christmas party every year. I’d go into their wood paneled basement and my older cousins and aunts and uncles would let me play pool. On the wood paneled wall there was a big poster for The Police. I don’t think it was for an album or anything, just for the band. Seeing that suggested a whole world to me–a world when these people who were all older than me were once as young as me. This song makes me think of an average morning in the early 1980s, the Police are on the radio, Regan is in the White House, the world—and the way that it is—is situated in a certain way. The Earth’s axis tilted at a specific angle. That’s all prehistory now. But this song takes me there. Sting has become whatever. The Police have always ripped.
“Alive and Kicking” by Simple Minds
Heard this one while waiting to get my hair cut. Dare I say it might be better than “(Don’t You) Forget About Me”? OK, even I’ll cop to that hyperbole. But listen to this song and tell me you aren’t invincible.
“Give It Up” by Talk Talk
Spirit of Eden (1988) is my favorite Talk Talk album and one of my ten favorite albums ever. It’s probably the ultimate April album. There is nothing quite like listening to that album. But “Give It Up” might be my favorite Talk Talk song. It is the easiest one for me to relisten to. You can’t put something like, oh the transcendent run of “The Rainbow”—>”Eden”—>”The Rainbow” on a playlist. But you can put “Give It Up.” I love Talk Talk.
“Something in the Room She Moves” by Julia Holter
I’ve written about my love for Julia Holter before. This might be the most approachable track on her new record. Absolutely beautiful. She is tapped into whatever Talk Talk and Mark Hollis were tapped into. Maybe I’ll get there someday.
“Unclear Sphere” by Marry Waterson and Adrian Crowley
This was an AllMusic Editor Pick and I took a shot on it. I like this track. Didn’t love the entire album. But this is the kind of song I would have absolutely ripped and made fun of in college and my early twenties. I’m growing up.
“I Paint a Design” by Michael Hurley
One of my fiance’s friends put this song on when we were having dinner on our screened in porch one evening. Warm, loose, and hypnotic. Good for a dinner scene. Feels like a song that would be diegetic music in a David Simon show.
“Run That Body Down” by Paul Simon
When I had the flu, I watched the four hour Paul Simon documentary on MGM+. (Do a seven day trial and then cancel. Treat yourself.) Simon and Garfunkel are such a strange band: maybe had one and a half coherent albums; career kind of happened in fits and starts; but still managed to have a dramatic break up that was in sync thematically with the title of their final album. And Simon is the rare 1960s pop star who seemed to get better after the 1960s. Paul spends some time recording down the road in Wimberley. Haven’t run into him yet. We aren’t in the same circles I guess. Watching the documentary made me realize he’s always been on his own wavelength. I loved his record from last year, Seven Psalms. But his self-titled solo record from 1972 is one of my favorite albums. “Run That Body Down” is one of those seemingly effortless Paul Simon tunes. It’s not effortless like McCartney at his best but it has its own strange American charm.
“U.F.O.” by Jim Sullivan
I heard this one before Jenny Lewis went onstage at her show in March. Don’t ask me how, but somehow I knew it was “U.F.O” by Jim Sullivan. Somewhere in this life I either sought out this album for some reason or knew this song somehow but I honestly don’t remember how or why. It’s been stuck in my head and it seemed to fit this period of time where everyone on the radio kept talking about all the people that would be coming into town to gaze skyward at the sun.
“Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp (Let It Roll)” by George Harrison
This is one of my favorite solo George Harrison songs and it always makes me think of April Why? Because during my junior year in college I came home for a long Easter weekend in April. It was a mild weekend. On Easter, we went to my great uncle Louie and great aunt Nancy’s house in Wantagh. It was an uneventful Easter. After dinner, I drove back up to school and listened to CD 2 of All Things Must Pass (1970). The evening came in and the air was damp and slightly hazy; the sky was pinkish gray; and this song was playing. For some reason, I felt so lonely leaving my family. It was like I could feel the pain of time always passing. I’ll never forget the kind of longing I felt in that moment and how this song kept rolling on as I drove and I didn’t want any of it to stop. That was over twenty years ago. My great aunt and uncle died in 2021 and 2022 respectively.
“Amelia” by Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell is back on Spotify. I swore I was going to get off Spotify and I still haven’t. This has become my favorite Joni Mitchell song and I wrote about it six years ago. I never get tired of it and no matter how many times I listen to it, I feel like I’m only beginning to understand how powerful it is.
“Turn to Stone” by ELO
I heard this song in a restaurant called The Toasty Badger. Say what you will about ELO, there’s nothing like listening to an ELO song and you always know when one comes on. Truly ridiculous music in the best way possible.
“Love in Constant Spectacle” by Jane Weaver
This was an AllMusic Editor’s Pick. I haven’t given Jane Weaver a lot of time, but I think this song, well, “slaps” as people say. Never quite picked that one up.
“As The Dogs Were Playing” by Good Morning
This was another AllMusic Editor’s Pick. You know something, AllMusic is pretty good at recommending music. I’m starting to think they might be my favorite website on the internet. This album is called Good Morning Seven (2024) and it is the band’s seventh record. It’s their first major label album and it sounds kind of like Wilco if Wilco was more obvious with their Beatles influence. I really am a certain kind of white guy.
“Lookin for a Love” by Neil Young
Neil Young is back on Spotify. I swore I was going to get off Spotify and I still haven’t. Am I a bad person? When I saw Neil was back on Spotify I spent an evening listening to a lot of music and thinking about him as a figure in my life: from listening to After the Gold Rush (1970) on cassette as a child in the back seat of my parent’s car to listening to Live Rust (1979) on CD in our living room to listening to Zuma (1976) while driving my car drunk and heartbroken in college and thinking I was doing something unique instead of doing something stupid. Neil Young’s music has accompanied me throughout my life and Zuma (and On the Beach and Tonight’s the Night) was the sound of a certain period when I indulged in my worst tendencies and confused that with having some kind of heart. My sign posts were already old when I came to them and I wonder if Neil Young and his music will die as the 20th century continues to die.
“The Surfer” by Vampire Weekend
Not sure how I feel about this record yet. Loved the last two from start to finish. First impression is that it’s too fussy for my tastes. But maybe it’ll grow on me. Regardless of my opinion, this record’s release was in the air all month.
“At the Zoo” by Simon and Garfunkel
This may actually be my favorite Simon and Garfunkel song. I don’t know why! I just love the melody and the entire production. It's erudite in a certain way that’s not as stuffy as most of their work aside from Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970). When I listen to this song it feels like one of those spring New York days when the sun is going down and a near 70-degree day starts to feel every bit of 55 and all of sudden there’s a haze hovering over those first budding flowers in the dirt.
“Bridge Over Troubled Water” by Aretha Franklin
Paul Simon is an amazing songwriter. “Bridge Over Troubled Water” is truly one of the all time great songs and I love the original with all my heart. The Simon and Garfunkel version means something different than this version: They feel like they are talking about two completely different things. And I love that.