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 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.

Leonard Cohen

I kind of hate Leonard Cohen. Let's be honest - I was never the biggest fan, and though I can see how in some alternate universe I might really dig his stuff, I'm don't whilst living in this one. It's like, the original Sad Bastard music (as opposed to other contemporary emo, Sad Bastard artists - I'm looking at you, Bright Eyes and Dashboard Confessional), and it makes me cranky. Combine this with the time-of-life circumstances - it was Mike's thing, and what he liked to noodle around playing on the guitar, and I very vividly recall the sing-a-long at Jerrica's going away party in early September 2005 - and it makes me insane. "Hey, That's No Way To Say Goodbye" and "So Long, Marianne," in particular.

I admit that I don't hate everything of Cohen's, and I care for it more when covered by other artists. But mostly, it drives me nutty.

Kings of Leon - Aha Shake Heartbreak

This album came out in late 2004, but I didn't get into it until spring of 2005. It was one of the first albums I purchased on i~Tunes (after hearing singles played on KEXP), and there was something about it - the twangy-ness, the southern-rock-ness, the gritty and awkward vocals, the self-referential and slightly vulgar lyrics, the songs as circumstantial snapshots lacking in happy endings - the latter few of qualities seemed to make it all just resonate for me at that time. I remember thinking that these were just some kids from Oklahoma, I think 19-21ish, and they made something that unexpectedly felt the way I felt. Living in the shitty Brooklyn apartment, spending my time in my dark bedroom initially suffering through my drawn-out crap relationship with Kurt that was slowing dying and had been doing so for months, feeling the hurt of being treated poorly and then the hurt of being alone. I willingly signed up for more. I spent a lot of February - early summer 2005 listening to this album.