It always seemed half-finished to me -- incredibly catchy, but not quite coherent. Not quite all there.
Like the difference between a great song and a classic song.
And whenever I find myself thinking things like this, I wonder if I'm asking too much.
If this song came from anyone else, I'd be thrilled. I'd remember it fondly and tell you a story about a girl who loved the song.
But the bar is higher for some musicians.
And that's not fair -- I know that.
We shouldn't judge someone harshly because they caught lightning in a bottle more than once and created true classics that will last for generations.
Maybe we should just concentrate on the feeling and try to capture the zen essence of things, letting the rest of it just blow away.
And yes, if you've been watching, there has been a new post up on this blog every single day in May -- plus a bonus of 2 posts on the 21st. There's no particular reason for this -- I just wanted to post more frequently this month and gave myself a challenge of putting up a new post every day.
Yep Roc, one of the coolest record labels that still exists, is throwing itself a 15th anniversary party with concerts and special events October 11-13 in Carrboro, NC.
Concerts will be held over three nights at the Cat's Cradle featuring Yep Roc artists like Robyn Hitchcock, Fountains of Wayne, Dave Alvin, John Doe, Nick Lowe, the Sadies, and John Wesley Harding.
In addition, the label is giving away free unreleased music from its vaults every month between now and October.
The first free Yep Roc giveaway is from Robyn Hitchcock, a beautiful song called "There Goes the Ice" that you can download for free here.
Robyn's description of the track:
"There Goes The Ice" was written in October 2008 off the coast of Greenland on board the Grigor Mikheev, the Russian ship chartered by Cape Farewell to take a collection of artists and scientists up to Disko Bay where we visited a region of the imperilled Arctic. The photographer Chris Wainwright, had just filmed me spelling out Here Comes The Sun in semaphore, silhouetted on deck against the sunset. Surrounded as we were by icebergs 'calved' from the rapidly melting Arctic ice-cap, I found myself writing There Goes The Ice as a mournful echo of George Harrison's song.
I took the song fresh to KT Tunstall and her husband Luke Bullen in the cabin next door: KT obligingly sang harmony and Luke recorded us. Back in England the following June, Luke recorded KT and I performing this version, in their tent. KT also plays guitar on this and appears here courtesy of EMI/Virgin records.
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