Solemn Meant Walks...at long last.

  Fucking finally!   Solemn Meant Walks! A Saturday at Debonair Social Club, this is officially the first time seeing them perform. Yet well before this gig, the ice was being broken and we've been friends.  Being late as bad as that is, was not a total loss because each time I ended up hanging around with the band and getting to know them. This one time when I bought their CD there sat on another table, my friends from Killer Moon.  That helps me tremendously, because I often go to these shows alone, and I wonder if that makes me look like this lone wolf weirdo.  Then they played with Spiritual Bat and I saw them, well not on stage....yeah, I was late.  By then I was actively listening to their music.  Anyway now I'm getting to know the recorded music, the self-titled CD. My original plan was to go see Circuit de Yeux and then SMW. The high from seeing one show to another, but I just could not spend the money on both and chose Solemn Meant Walks!
  The live experience keeps the music in the present mind, and it brings out the layers not considered when listening at home to the recorded work.  I did not know Highway was about Resurrection Mary until Ami said so in this last concert. Before then I just liked the song for how it sounded to me. Resurrection Mary is our local incarnation of a ghostly vanishing hitchhiking archetype. Ami's voice is deep, haunting and just right for going on about her. There's a maturity to her voice so she ain't tryin' to sound like anything. Seeing them live prompted me to look the video up. Its great! There are so many ways to like this video. I've driven around some of the places the video for Highway was filmed, Willow Springs. I live close. The places feel familiar, yet still effortlessly mysterious.  Each band member seemed to have their own moment with Mary in the places she has been sited. And then Ami stopped for her and drove Mary around. Ami is a rare female exception for Ms Mary. She normally does not compel women to stop.
   And I came across research that suggests Resurrection Mary was a Back of the Yards girl when she was alive. OK that last bit has nothing to do with the band. I fucking love when music is so damn local, using and invoking the local legends.  The whole vicious cycle begins again.  I can better describe the songs I like. Fleeting is now a focus.  Meaning.....wow! The song picks up fast and is transparent enough for you to see and admire clearly the engine that drives the track forward with Ami's voice swirling forward. Its the type of song that you commit to liking it before you even fully understand lyrics. And so its like that with Fleeting. I catch phrases that stand out, and I don't do linear.   Certain phrases stand out in the middle of the song and ....
  I went jogging on some cold wet Monday and I played SMW on my ipod. I let the music find its own way into my mind, rather than forcing it. When I first read about them, in part because we have many friends in common, I liked their music right away. I must have come across them on bandcamp or something similar. I took one listen for maybe two minutes. I don't even recall which track and concluded that it was awesome, but I would not indulge in hearing it again until I bought the CD. And that is just me, sometimes I cannot indulge until I own. And even then what was found in the first spontaneous listen may not be there when you listen again. So I don't force it, and let the music find its place. And you know what? That works. And I find myself in awe again over my everyday surroundings and routines. And I need that too.
Zig