TV Girl and The Center of the Universe

“Hey. Hey. Dude. Dude! This guy? Is a CHODE. But I like it.” – RF

TV Girl’s French Exit was one of my favorite albums of 2014. And their Wednesday night Noise Pop gig at Brick & Mortar Music Hall is now one of my favorite live musical experiences of the new year.

Granted, it’s only the second time I’ve been to a show in twenty-fifteen, and that last one was less than memorable, but still. This one will stand out.

And it wasn’t really because of the band.

Hundred Waters and Thousand Sunsets

This isn’t my first blog post of the new year, but it may as well be.

Roughly this time last year, I was rediscovering music: its past importance to me, its significance in The Turnaround, its role in my every day. And, partnered with a very personal need to journal again, I spun what I thought might have been the best pieces of the Idle Time site into threads of what I’d hoped to be something new, or, at least, something of the new me.

If that sounds directionless and vague, it was. Which is unfortunate, in a sense, because the last thing I’d wanted as a hallmark of my twenty-fourteen was a lack of direction. But as it turned out, moving forward — or backward, or sideways, or whatever direction the wind, song, or Sunday required — without my mind constantly fixated on the What’s Next was the best thing for me.

2014 was a year of being in the present. It was my most introspective, self-realizing year, built up from the ashes of a year I’d hoped to soon forget.

More Ruth, Please.

A few weeks ago Jonny Jewel dropped this amazing rendition of “These Streets Will Never Look the Same” with vocals by Ruth Radelet.