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emelbe
For one more drop of blood,
We work our fingers down to dust
And we wait for kingdom come
With the radio on
“Mae”, Handwritten, The Gaslight Anthem
1. I picked up The ‘59 Sound in anticipation for a concert that I ended up not attending. I listened to it enough to know I liked it, recommended The Gaslight Anthem to a friend of mine who is an enormous Springsteen fan, and then stopped for a while, obsessed over other things, like I do. Recently it returned to heavy rotation. Every time I listened to it, it was the warehouse scene from Footloosein my head.
2. A couple weeks ago I went back home to take care of some family things. Stressful things. I drove my father’s car for the duration of the trip and I’m pretty sure all I listened to was The ‘59 Sound. I found it homey and comforting when I was home and in need of comforting. Little snippets would make me smile. “Still love Tom Petty songs and drivin’ old men crazy…” as I drove around Tom Petty’s hometown. “There were Southern accents on the radio as I drove home…” as I was acclimating to them and trying to keep my own at bay. I gave some vague thought to picking up other albums but, you know, later.
3. I went back to work last week and was approached by another friend to see if I wanted to see Gaslight Anthem in concert. I picked up Handwritten and listened to it obsessively for the rest of the week. I grabbed a ticket for the Springsteen fan above and five of us went to dinner then to see them last night. We sang, we danced, we screamed. I was reminded how much I can love live music. (And how much I can hate the crowds at many live music venues; I also managed to avoid getting into a fistfight with a dude who was being inappropriately physical with one of our group but that’s neither here nor there.) But it was amazing. Feeling the music through the souls of my feet, in my chest, behind my eyes. Practically shouting lyrics at each other. And I’m pretty sure all of us who had songs we were really hoping to hear, heard them. I won’t say I’ll make an effort to do this more because I know how that’s likely to go. I will, at least, remain receptive to it.