The Long Winters - When I Pretend To Fall

Summer of 2003. I am a newly-minted college graduate, have moved back across the country for what I then think is only a temporary pulling-my-shit-together break before jumping into a young, urban, professional existence in our nation's capital (in a non-existent job) living with a friends (who actually do have some kind of plan, unlike myself). Living at home, adopting/being adopted by a tangental group of friends, reactivating dormant crushes, crushing and being crushed, spending through my savings, being grounded, filming a movie. This is how I spent my summer vacation. Patrick burned me a copy of this CD, and I wore through it. The songs are each important, relevant in their own way - "Cinnamon" used to irritate but I became enamored; "Stupid" was my story; "Blanket Hog," "Bride and Bridle," it goes on and on. "Nora" is the most potent, for me, and it brings me back to the sadness of the end of the summer, the realities of who I was, who I was dealing with, and the world in which I had to exist. I still think I (mostly) made the right decisions, but I guess one never knows.

The liner notes have letters that John Roderick has received from girls he has dated. It is hilariously sad. Mike used to say, imagining the average female listener (but mostly imagining me) and her response to John's lyrics and life, that "I could change him!" I couldn't, but it will never keep me from saying it.

The Clash - London Calling

I listened to this at Justin's old house, just off of Roosevelt. It was winter break of my last year of university, but was followed up in bulk that summer. I waited years, and among other things (a box full of uniforms; grounded; a copy of Anna Karenina; the inclination to stay in Seattle; a wide variety of emotional baggage) that I got from again living in the same city as him was a love of this album. "Train In Vain" is my favorite song. This is perhaps the most prominent entry in my ledger of "100% tension, 0% compatibility" relationships. Fortunately, there is good company in this group, due if to nothing else than to the law of large numbers.

The Pixies

A confession: I don't really care for The Pixies. I mean, I like them okay, and I understand their role in influencing many bands that I do truly like, but I'm kinda over them (to be perfectly honest, I never really got into it in the first place). I own so many albums because the Scooby boys were into them - I first stole some cds from Patrick, and then I bought the rest. Mike was into them and I magically had the cds, because I wanted to be cool and I wanted the greater Scooby circle (beyond Patrick and Justin, who I already knew) to like me. Mike was the last point in the trinity and I wanted to be fully ushered in to the Scooby inner sanctum, which was all I had after leaving university and moving home. Hence, The Pixies. However, I do like "Monkey Goes To Heaven," "Where Is My Mind?," and "Caribou." Little did I know that when I went to my only Sasquatch music festival, in May 2005 with Mike as my chaperon, that they would be headlining. Looking back on that show and the line-up, I would have seen very different bands were I to attend today. But it's all sort of full-circle, I suppose.