The world waits for you

A few weeks ago I had a conversation with a friend of mine about music. Actually, the conversation was the differences in our music fandoms as evidenced by our CD collections. She is an actual musician who is the type to form impromptu bluegrass bands and loves playing music and listening to bands but has a CD collection that could fit on a small bookshelf. I, on the other hand, can barely remember how to read sheet music and have a CD collection that requires my apartment to have a reinforced floor along with the fact that I cart around my tape collection even though I don’t actually own a cassette player anymore. She asked me a very good question, “Why in the world do you buy so much music?”

I didn’t have a very good answer to that question then and I don’t have a better one now. All I can say is that after the past two days I know why I live my life the way I do. Because otherwise I would never have experiences like this.

I took Friday off from work, which isn’t a big story in and of itself. I mean, a lot of people take three day weekends. But I had a really specific purpose for my day off. I drove to Columbia, Missouri in order to see Son Volt in concert. This means that I was willing to drive two hours one way to see a band that a) I’ve already seen this year and b) was actually playing two blocks from my apartment the next day. But logic really wasn’t going to apply here given that Jay Farrar is one of the few people I consider to be my idol. There was no way I was going to miss a chance to see him play live. Plus, it gave me a chance to see all of those towns that I only know exist through weather reports like Boonville and Grain Valley.

It was just a spot on show. While this edition of Son Volt isn’t the same as the one in 1995 they still put on a great set. Played basically every song that is on their latest album but also went back into the catalog for music over the past decade. Jay still amazes me with his playing style in that he does not show any emotion on stage. None. He just stands there, plays guitar without any grandstanding and sings all of these passionate, heartfelt lyrics. I don’t know how he does it. I’m jumping around in the crowd listening to these songs, I don’t know how you could play them without pogoing the entire time. The easy highlight for me was getting to hear the last song. There are about a dozen things that I want to experience in my life and getting to hear Jay Farrar play “Chickamauga” takes care of about five of them.

After making the drive home Friday night (and oh boy, is it fun driving through western Missouri at two in the morning) I rested up in order to make my way to Lawrence on Saturday night for a show that somehow topped Son Volt. You knew it was going to be a good show from the moment Josh Ritter took the stage to open the show. Josh, who is just a guy from Idaho when you get down to it, had a smile on his face that you couldn’t take off with a jackhammer. This was a guy who was just so damn happy to know that he had the chance to play his songs on a Saturday night. It didn’t matter that it was in a half-filled club in the middle of Kansas, there wasn’t anything that could take him away from this moment. He just put on a great set, there have been a lot of comments about his music comparing him to Dylan and while that is a bit of hyperbole (as in basically any decent songwriter with an acoustic guitar gets compared to Dylan) he had an awful lot of really good songs. And his mood was just infectious.

Then it was time for The Frames to take the stage.

There is no one on this planet who could convince me that there is a band out there who is better live than The Frames. They don’t exist. No one can touch the energy and humor and power that this band puts on stage. From the moment they came on stage saying “Hi, were The Frames and were from Ireland” and then immediately went into “Keepsake” (a song about breaking your key in the lock and setting your house on fire) to ending the final encore with “Star, Star”, a song that segues into a Willy Wonka number at odd intervals, they had the crowd in the palm of their hands.

It’s always tough for me to describe seeing shows because while a music critic will talk about what they played and how they sound I find that to be incredibly boring. The reason I listen to music and the reason why I buy so many CDs is because at its core, I am searching for albums that make my life understandable and The Frames have been that for me. Back in February, when absolutely nothing was making sense and I was seriously wondering how I would get through the day sometimes, I always knew that I could put on “Burn the Maps” and somehow the world would be better. So as I was standing in front of the stage, singing along to every song, I wasn’t trying to figure out the cultural significance of each number or determining who had influenced the band’s style. I was celebrating the sheer fact that I am alive and have somehow created a life where I can discover this band from Dublin that no one has ever heard of and have them change my life.

When the show ended all of us in the crowd just kind of looked at each other and went “Wow.” We all knew that this was an incredible moment that so few people get to experience. It’s the type where you left the club feeling like you should go out and benchpress cars or something, there is just so much energy in you from that moment. It is proof of what you can accomplish when you are passionate for what you do in life.

You can make an argument that I spend too much money on music. That I travel too far to go to concerts of bands that no one has ever heard of where it ends up being just me in front of the stage. It probably isn’t future executive behavior or even proper adult behavior. But I wouldn’t trade anything for the chance to see a band like The Frames from the foot of the stage. It’s moments like that which make life special, which prevent you from having to live that pedestrian life. Music is my route to those moments. Who could find fault in that?

The five random CDs of the week:
1) Smashing Pumpkins “Siamese Dreams”
2) John Wesley Harding “Awake”
3) Ben Folds Five “Whatever and Ever Amen”
4) The Connells “Ring”
5) Maggie Walters “Maggie Walters”