For the spirit ever lingers

Like John Cusack in High Fidelity, a bunch of us has been making top ten lists for the past thirty or so years.  It started with a group of friends gathered in a north Jersey diner with lists written in ballpoint on the back of paper placemats, and eventually expanded to include me and a couple hundred other people.  Some of us were musicians, or somehow connected to musicians, but we were all motivated enough each January to devote significant time and energy to the Critics Poll: making our cases for the best album, or best single, or best use of a nontraditional instrument in a pop song, etc. of the previous year.

As many of the Critics approached their sixth decade on this planet, the energy for this sort of activity began to ebb.  Careers, families, illness, and/or lack of desire to engage with the new Deerhunter album would get in the way, and many of us would find ourselves in November having listened to hardly any new music that year.  Fewer and fewer of us bothered to fill out a ballot, and finally Tris McCall, organizer of the Poll from its inception, stopped compiling it.  Fortunately, McCall – musician, music critic, one of my former bandmates, and honest-to-God genius – carried on publishing his own ballot on his website, as well as his Listening Schedule: a list of a hundred or so albums released during the past year to be (re)listened to, two per day, from early December until the end of January. 

I’m not sure specifically what inspired me to take up the challenge of following along with the Listening Schedule this year.  The fact that I would even consider this a “challenge” says something about my own state of mind.  Too many of my waking hours are filled with social media and other nonsense, so there’s no reason I shouldn’t make time to engage with some actual art, or at least what the kids are up to these days.  In any case, I’m glad I did.  Despite the untimely demise of the man who was the #1 influence on my humble musical life, 2019 was a fantastic year in music.   

Top Ten Albums of 2019

10.  Julia Jacklin — Crushing.  Invites comparisons to Courtney Barnett: Aussie, fronting a four-piece, but a much better singer, playing things much straighter and less noisily.  She sings about how our identities are informed (defined?) by our relationships, and how when the latter collapses, so does the former.

9.  Pivot Gang — You Can’t Sit with Us.  Thrilling, smart, deep hip-hop.  Eeyore name-dropped in the first 15 seconds of the opening track.

8.  Homeboy Sandman — Dusty.  This would feel right at home alongside the Native Tongues, with references to golf and public broadcasting over early-70’s electric piano, funky drums, etc.  A point driven home by the track “Why?” (a erstwhile response to ATCQ’s “What?”) and his uncanny channeling of Dres from Black Sheep about two-thirds of the way through the album.

7.  Lana Del Rey — Norman Fucking Rockwell.  I am reduced to saying that I feel like this is an artist is in a class of her own, for better or worse.  This album sounds like slow motion feels.

6.  JPEGMafia — All My Heroes Are Cornballs.  Whoa.  Off the deep end psychedelic hip-hop.

5.  Bruce Hornsby — Absolute Zero.  Kind of like if Tom Waits had decided to sing about nucleotides and cryopreservation rather than about sailors and prostitutes.  No, that’s not doing this justice.  Bruce Hornsby is certainly geeky enough, but he is massively soulful, and the playing and arrangements on this are out of sight.  Jazz drumming demigod Jack DeJohnette makes an appearance.

4.  Ezra Furman — Twelve Nudes.  Hurtles from Hüsker Dü speedballs to generational anthems.  Triumphant and hilarious and beautiful.

3.  Sego — Sego Sucks.  Swaggering post-punk drenched in fuzz bass and irony.  Less casual than you might initially think.  Recommended if you like Butthole Surfers and early Beck.

2.  Andrew Bird — My Finest Work Yet.  This is a great album, in the 70’s singer-songwriter tradition: reedy vocals; roomy, organic production, with string arrangements that never sound over-the-top; superb drumming.  Everything in its place, but not fussy.  Unexpected chords thrown in the 3^rd or 4^th time through a verse which always seem to work.  I wanted every song to go on for longer. 

1.  Richard Dawson — 2020.  Like Celtic folk meets the Fiery Furnaces meets Captain Beefheart meets XTC.  Also like nothing else you’ve heard before in your life.  Over the course of a single listen, I found myself laughing, cheering, crying, applauding, fist pumping, and singing along.  I realized today that listening to this album is like reading David Foster Wallace’s best essays.  Both manage to capture the horror and ugliness and absurdity and fragility and struggle and undeniable beauty of Today’s World, while at the same time flooring you with their technical mastery, while at the same time somehow making you feel loved.  My best album of 2019 by a country mile.

For the curious / bored / insomniac among you, here are my notes on the rest of the Listening Schedule.  Caveat: I listened to most of the albums of this list a total of one time, so I may be way off the mark on some of them. (* = recommended)

2 Chainz — Rap or Go to The League.  I don’t care how sympathetic a character you are (and 2 Chainz is an extremely sympathetic character), no one but no one wants to hear about your high school sports glory days.  Still, as someone who has logged many thousands of hours shooting free throws, I do appreciate his allusion to the “BEEF” (Balance, Elbow, Eyes, Follow-through) jump shot technique.  Also wins the award for best income tax optimization strategy on record in 2019. 

American Football — American Football (LP3).  Don’t let the band / album name fool you: these guys are harmless.  A fondness for guitar arpeggios and odd time signatures.  I feel like there could be a prog act in here somewhere waiting to be unleashed, but they’re too old for that.  Also too much first-person singular in the lyrics.

Anemone — Beat My Distance.  Reverb all around, and sustained organ running through every song like someone highlighting every word on every page of a book.  The front woman sings about men she likes, and men she doesn’t (perhaps it’s the same man).  The bass player keeps himself very busy.

Belle & Sebastian — Days of The Bagnold Summer.  Glaswegian chamber-poppers settle into tweedy middle age, with gentle acoustic ballads, several instrumentals which sound like the soundtrack to a movie about Belle & Sebastian, and a note-for-note cover of a song off their first album.  I think I liked Stuart Murdoch better when he was primarily confused and horny, but this will do.

Better Oblivion Community Center — Better Oblivion Community Center.  Acoustic-y and indie-y act with male and female vocalists who often sing in unison but not in harmony just in different octaves.  This could be kind of cute and joyful like Mates of State, but I found it distracting, like you can’t figure out which one of them to listen to.  Some good lyrics though.

Big Thief — U.F.O.F./Two Hands.  If Joanna Newsom and Jesse Sykes had a love child who put out two albums a year, this is what it would sound like. 

Blood Orange — Angel’s Pulse.  I was going to say that this sounds like a collaboration between The Weeknd and the guys from Air, but didn’t those guys already collaborate on something?  Or maybe it was Daft Punk.  This probably deserves more than one listen.

Danny Brown — uknowhatimsayin¿  He seems to have gotten things back onto the rails somewhat, which I’m happy about for his sake.  However, I’m not sure if I find this version of Danny Brown as interesting as the one who spent his afternoons snorting Adderall off the kitchen counter.  This probably says something not so nice about my relationship to the artist. 

* Camila Cabello — Romance.  The most likable of the current crop of top 40 stars.  Multi-octave vocal gymnastics, sly production, and the requisite teenage friskiness.

Calliope Musicals — Color/Sweat.  I’m not quite sure what this band is up to.  Singer pogo-s around like Dale Bozzio.  Songs that range from disco anthems to Britpop-sounding stuff to a final track that worships a paper cup of whiskey.  Your guess is as good as mine.

Chance the Rapper — The Big Day.  Clever rhymes and guest appearances from everyone from Nikki Minaj to Death Cab for Cutie to Randy Newman.  Still, I can’t shake the impression that I’m listening to this generation’s Will Smith.

* Charly Bliss — Young Enough.  They’ve gone full Metric on this one, with blaring synths outgunning the Fender Jaguars.  Who can blame them, as the guys over at Netflix are probably falling all over themselves to get Charly Bliss to do the soundtrack for one of their new coming-of-age dramedies.  This didn’t quite reach the heights of Guppy, but I think they’ll will be with us for a little while, which is a good thing.

Frances Cone — Late Riser.  Whenever I used to put on music that my father didn’t know, he would inevitably say, “Sounds just like Fleetwood Mac.”  Here’s one case where he would have been right, as the lead singer does a credible vodka-breathy Stevie Nicks impression, and a couple of these songs wouldn’t sound out of place on Tusk.  Errs on the moody side.

* Rodney Crowell — Texas.  If you’ve been tempted to read that Hillbilly Elegy book, listen to this instead.  Telecaster twang, grizzled guest stars, and red state America in 2019.

* Denzel Curry — Zuu.  Euphoric, shameless hip-hop, due east of Manny Fresh, at roughly the same latitude.

* Stella Donnelly — Beware of The Dogs.  Cute Australian sings about dark stuff over bright chords. 

* Drake — Care Package.  The Manchester City of rap music, delivering quality each time out, if not always at the top of the table.  Rich and famous people can get awfully tedious though.  This album needed to be about 1/3 shorter.

The Early November — Lilac.  NJ emo darlings ditch some of their guitar angst for keyboards and mellower flows.  I probably need to listen to this a few more times.

Rose Elinor Dougall — A New Illusion.  Piano-driven straight-ahead pop/rock, heavy on the sustain pedal, and with a punchier rhythm section that one might expect at first.  The singer evidently used to be in a band called the Pipettes. 

* Billie Eilish — When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?  I loved the lead single from the first time I heard it on the radio.  The rest of the album doesn’t quite live up to it, but it holds its own.  You’ve probably read enough about her already, so I’ll just say that it’s nice to see the Leslie speaker (or the digital equivalent thereof) getting some PT in 2019.

Elbow — Giants of All Sizes.  The kings of waltz time, back with big, shiny production and Guy Garvey’s presentation of every syllable of every lyric as if it were a Fabergé egg.  I fear that they don’t have much interesting to say, or perhaps I’m just not listening closely enough.

Fontaines D.C. — Dogrel.  Little margin for error for groups like this.  You need either a consistently funny lyricist or a kick-ass rhythm section, or else a full-length becomes tedious. 

* Dori Freeman — Every Single Star.  A nice tidy package of a country album.  No bells and whistles, just compact arrangements under thoughtful lyrics about love and loss, with a few unexpected chord changes and shaved measures.

* The Futureheads — Power.  The smarter, but less successful, and therefore more bitter, and therefore smarter, and therefore less successful, and therefore more bitter younger siblings of the Kaiser Chiefs.

Gang Starr — One of The Best Yet.  Old-school hip-hop revival, picking up where it left off.  I was never really into them the first time around, so the nostalgia factor is kinda lost on me, but this is good.

Freddie Gibbs & Madlib — Bandana.  Madlib’s tracks have always left me feeling anxious and claustrophobic, like being at one of the 1950’s cocktail party scenes he likes to sample, with shrill horns and laughing, drunk women.  Freddie Gibbs’s inspired logorrhea doesn’t save the day.

GoldLink — Diaspora.  Nimble, quick DC rapper.  His beats become more interesting the farther they venture into “ethnic” sounds and rhythms.  One to keep an eye on, I think.

Marika Hackman — Any Human Friend.  Manages to sing for 40 minutes about sex without being the least bit sexy. 

Courtney Hartman — Ready Reckoner.  Acoustic folk aimed squarely at the “Mountain Stage” crowd.  As if to leave no doubt, one track even features the sound of someone hiking, chirping crickets and all.  The artist you are looking for is Laura Marling.

The Highwomen — The Highwomen.  At the vertex of the Venn diagram formed by the Travelling Wilburys, The View, and Sassy Mom t-shirts, lies this supergroup of B-list female country vocalists.  I imagine that there is a demographic that would adore this, and boy oh boy am I not in it

* Injury Reserve — Injury Reserve.  This feels like watching an episode of Atlanta, or like watching Vines, or doing both at the same time.  Clever, honest hip-hop with unexpected yet effective vocal effect glitches.

The Japanese House — Good at Falling.  Inoffensive electronica.

* Carly Rae Jepsen — Dedicated.  Extremely well-conceived and executed bubble-gum pop.  Puzzling album sequencing, as the first two songs are kind of crappy, and the rest are great. This could be a result of some record company AI-driven algorithm that is beyond my comprehension.

* King Princess — Cheap Queen.  Things seem to be calibrated just right here.  Singing is soulful but not hammy or cloying.  Arrangements are groovy but not overly derivative.  Production throwing just enough curves to keep the batter from sitting on fastballs.  Maybe I was just in a good mood the day I listened to this.  Or maybe the songs are just really good.

Steve Lacy — Apollo XXI.  Jazzy chords, falsetto, and sex lyrics do not a Prince make.

* Mon Laferte — Norma.  I hesitate to simply label this as “Latin pop,” because it’s a genre I know nothing about, but I do think it sums up what’s going on here: Spanish vocals, Latin percussion, horns, acoustic guitar.  Fronted by a Chilean dynamo who jumps from nightclub vamping to insane wailing to capable rapping to Guinness-book-worthy rolling of her “r’s.”  Should probably do for Chile what Bjork did for Iceland, although for all I know she already has.

* Miranda Lambert — Wildcard.  High-quality modern country with top-notch musicianship as always.  I can’t look past some of the tired C&W tropes (twangy vox, pedal steel, sour mash harmonies), and the ethos that alcohol and sass will solve all one’s problems.  But this is good and real.

Jenny Lewis — On the Line.  I believe I’m supposed to like this artist, but I am not at all a fan of Jenny Lewis’ singing voice.  Matters are made worse by the brassy, overdriven vocal effect they’ve put her through.  Seems to want to channel Kate Bush or Carole King, but neither the songs nor the performance quite gets there for me.  The artist you are looking for is Lana Del Rey.

* Jimmy Eat World — Surviving.  Emo with a bit of the vocal edge sanded down.  Do I hear Night Ranger here?  Awesome guitar tone, and not afraid to let the songs breathe.

Little Simz — Grey Area.  Energetic British female emcee.  Sampled soul beats are a little trite, and I’m not sure she has enough to say for a full LP.  A for effort.

* Lizzo — Cuz I Love You.  Feels closer to an original cast recording of “Self-Empowerment: The Musical” than a pop or R&B album.  A+ for effort, and a welcome and inevitable guest appearance from Missy Elliott.

Metronomy — Metronomy Forever.  The artist you are looking for is LCD Soundsystem.  I did like the song in which the narrator is the drummer.

Mdou Moctar — Ilana (The Creator).  How do all these Touareg dudes end up with Stratocasters?  This is cool for a while, but ends up drifting down the Rio de Santana a bit too far for my taste.

Maren Morris — Girl.  This artist is not exactly sure what she should be.  She would technically be filed under “Country,” and she does try to pull a Miranda Lambert imitation, although not really convincingly, on “Some of My Favorite People.”  I think that she really wants to be Ariana Grande when she grows up, and I wish her luck with that.  Winner of the Mixed Metaphor of the Year award for that single about bones and houses not falling, etc. 

* Van Morrison — Three Chords & The Truth.  Truth indeed, as Van the Man reminds us all how it’s done, and how much he still has left in the tank.  I do feel like I deserve some kind of royalty for the drum part I played on a song called “Mergers & Acquisitions” back in ’96, but then again every note I’ve ever played on the drums is indebted to Neal Peart, so it all balances out.

Morrissey — California Son.  Somehow Morrissey and Van Morrison are able to capture the angst and horror of the world in 2019 better than almost anyone.  Something to be said for experience, and crotchety-ness.  (See also last year’s Roger Waters abum)

The New Pornographers — In the Morse Code of Brake Lights.  Carl Newman and his band of merry Canadians are back at it, and they stay faithful to their formula of unexpected chord sequences and clever-ish but indecipherable lyrics.  A few songs here will get your head bobbing, but I can’t say they’ve trod any new ground this millennium.

* Olden Yolk — Living Theatre.  Really good.  I detect The Clientele, Real Estate, REM, Carly Simon?  Moody but not morose.

Operator Music Band — Duo Duo.  This aspires to Art with a capital A, from the album cover onward, à la Stereolab.  Some groovy keyboard, but I fear that the quality of the songwriting doesn’t quite get there.

Oso Oso — Basking in The Glow.  Pretty vocal harmonies and judicious use of guitar distortion distinguish this from your run-of-the-mill emo.  One could do worse.

The Paranoid Style — A Goddamn Impossible Way of Life.  I probably should have listened to this more closely, but I was cooking dinner.  Like Eleanor Friedburger on amphetamines, but lower-quality musicianship, and some questionable production / engineering choices.  Music like this works best when it’s stripped down (think Telecasters through a Fender Twin), but they tried to go for “beefy” (think Les Pauls through Marshall stacks), yet meanwhile the bass drum sounds like me flicking a cardboard box with my index finger.  I shouldn’t be so critical. 

Pedro The Lion — Phoenix.  The Karl Ove Knausgaard of guitar rock.  Prosaic nostalgia for lost youth, executed with shameless and tireless clarity.

Caroline Polachek — Pang.  Female vocalist over keyboard tracks which alternate between moody and jumpy. 

Mike Posner — A Real Good Kid.  Dude knows his way around a pop song, and my sincere condolences on his loss, but this is some solipsistic, Camp-Rock-sounding stuff.  It will probably sell a gazillion copies, if it already hasn’t.

Pronoun — I’ll Show You Stronger.  Dense with chime-y guitars and 16^th notes on the hi-hat.  I have no idea what the lead singer is on about, as she’s buried deep in the mix somewhere, and she sings in some kind of ESL accent (even though the Internets say she’s from Boston?), often with some weird glottal auto-tremolo.  Lyrics: they still matter.

* The Rails — Cancel the Sun.  As if Richard and Linda Thompson had stayed married and gotten really into Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

The Rocket Summer — Sweet Shivers.  Remember that scene in Footloose when Kevin Bacon is all angry about something, so he goes to that abandoned warehouse and dances?  This album is like that.  These guys are good at their instruments though, especially the drummer.

Lucy Rose — No Words Left.  Despite the title, this is not an album of instrumentals.  Would fit right in on the Sirius/XM “Coffeehouse” channel.

* Ximena Sariñana — ¿Dónde Bailarán Las Niñas?  The Snoop Dogg of Latin pop.  Laid-back clave beats, 80’s synths and a Mexicana vocalist who delivers all the songs, even the dancier numbers, without breaking a sweat.  Easy listening. 

* Say Anything — Oliver Appropriate.  I’m very late to the Say Anything party.  And while the overall style on display here – delivering every syllable and plucking every guitar string as if his life depended on it – can wear on you, there’s enough here to merit a recommendation.  Songs, and song fragments (am I the only one hearing Guided by Voices here?) about drugs and love and death, fully earnest but leaving room for cleverness.

Nico Segal & Nate Fox — Intellexual.  Floaty, jazzy R&B / hip-hop stylings.  At my day job, we would say that this “fails to get traction.”

Sleeper — The Modern Age.  Guitar-driven “alternative rock” (whatever that means these days) with a female vocalist who would benefit from some pitch correction.  I appreciate the energy, but I feel like there are a fifty thousand other bands around like this, many of whom do this better.

Solange — When I Get Home.  Moody / arty R&B, with great basslines and unexpected synth.  I should probably appreciate Solange more.

Somos — Prison on A Hill.  Apple Music categorizes this as “punk,” but this is light years away from the Melvins.  I hear more REO Speedwagon, or Grace Under Pressure-era Rush.  Chorus-y guitars and electronic drum fills abound, along with earnest lyrics about war and climate change.

* Bruce Springsteen — Western Stars.  The arid plains and dust bowls of Nebraska and Ghost of Tom Joad have been peeled back to reveal a technicolor Western epic, swooping strings and horns ablaze like in that “Welcome to America” video they play at passport control at Logan Airport.  At first, you might worry that there’s some MAGA-esque mythologizing going on here, but, Bruce being Bruce, there’s more than enough bitter to offset the sweet.

Laura Stevenson — The Big Freeze.  Further evidence of the profound influence of Stevie Nicks on today’s music.

* Harry Styles — Fine Line.  Very listenable MOR pop music.  I should know this guy already, right?

Taylor Swift — Lover.  All blemishes have been airbrushed away.  There’s a clever line here and there, and the vocal performance is solid, but I honestly found Mike Posner more sympathetic than this, and that’s saying something.

Tegan And Sara — Hey, I’m Just Like You.  This appeared on the listening schedule right after JPEGMafia, I suspect not unintentionally, as this is an effective palate-cleanser.  Like sorbet, cool and leaving you ready for the next course.  I imagine this is on heavy rotation among Women’s and Gender Studies majors.

Tyler, The Creator — Igor.  Aimless and indulgent.  A couple of cool beats and a bit of decent rapping and a whole lot of nonsense. 

Vampire Weekend — Father of The Bride.  There’s no rational reason why I shouldn’t like this.  The songs are good, the singing is good, the arrangements are good, each snare drum sound is more impeccable than the last.  Maybe I’m jealous? 

* John Van Deusen — (I Am) Origami, Pt. 3 — A Catacomb Hymn.  The drummer avoids the crash cymbal enough to keep us on just this side of the border to Emo-town.  Vocals like Michael Stipe, songs like Matthew Sweet, and an album title that sounds like it came out of a Rush-song-title-generator bot.  There’s something here, though, and in fact there are a Pts. 1 and 2, the latter of which Apple Music classifies as “Christian & Gospel.”  I believe this guy deserves a closer look.

Vanishing Twin — The Age of Immunology.  Arty psychedelia that sounds like is was made by some kind of “collective.”  Being a fan of both “art” and “psychedelia,” I can dig it, although the tri-lingual spoken word bits are more Guggenheim than Ummagumma.

Wand — Laughing Matter.  What the hell happened to this band?  Someone probably told them that they sound like Radiohead, and they took that as a license to go on a seven-year-long aimless jam.  Unfortunate.

Weezer — Black Album.  I’m always interested in hearing what Rivers Cuomo has to say.  This time out he’s ditched his overdrive pedal for a wah-wah and a piano, and the results are hit-or-miss.  Irresistible lead single and top-notch drumming, though.

Aaron West & The Roaring Twenties — Routine Maintenance.  Emo guys doing emo-Americana, with thoughtful arrangements.

Kanye West — Jesus Is King.  If you’ve been following Kanye from the beginning, you know that the religion thing is not a gimmick.  I’m not sure how well his theology reconciles with Matthew 19:29, though, and I get the feeling he didn’t really try too hard this time out. 

* Billy Woods & Kenny Segal — Hiding Places.  I had no idea what to expect when I first put this on.  From the artists’ names I thought maybe country?  This is a long, long way from Seals & Crofts.  Cold-eyed hip-hop with beats to burn, from two guys who sound like they may have some post-Operation-Enduring-Freedom PTSD to sort out.

Jamila Woods — LEGACY! LEGACY!  Confident and capable R&B, hammering home a message of self-empowerment, each track named in all caps after various idols of hers.

White Reaper — You Deserve Love.  The antithesis of the Black Angels: heavy on the “white,” light on the “reaper.”  Badfinger / Cheap Trick for the end of the decade. 

* Y La Bamba — Mujeres.  The more straight-ahead numbers sound like Camera Obscura, which I don’t think plays to her strengths.  When she lets her formidable rhythm section head off at full gallop, this becomes transcendent.

Young Thug — So Much Fun.  Feels a bit like a genre exercise in modern rap music, although maybe this is actually the genre and modern rap music is the exercise.

Lux et Tenebrae

The girls spent this Christmas with us in Geneva.  Before they arrived, we had talked about all the fun things we might do – a day trip to Lyon, a water-park outing – but instead we stayed at home and cooked and ate and played board games.  Lydia and I let them stay in our bedroom, since it’s bigger than the guest bedroom and there are three of them,  so it wasn’t long before an undergrowth of beauty products and sweatpants and bras took root across the floor.  Because they don’t live with me (I was about to add “full-time,” but the qualifier is kind of unnecessary and also represents a certain sense of denial), I think I find myself feeling their presence, and a subtle hum of joy from their presence, more than I otherwise would. 

We played a lot of Deception: Murder in Hong Kong, a semi-cooperative game in which some players (“Investigators”) are trying to identify a murder weapon and a clue out of a collection of weapons and clues on cards in front of each player.  (The "Hong Kong" bit is irrelevant, but for thematic consistency everything is written in both English and what I assume is Cantonese).  Some of the weapons/clues are obvious ones (“axe”), while others are more bizarre (“e-bike”?) and/or gruesome (“surgery”).  One of the players (the “Forensic Scientist”) silently tries to direct players to the right weapon/clue by providing more information about the crime, using different cards covering the appearance of the scene, the location, the motive, etc..  One player is the “Assassin,” and only she and the Forensic Scientist know who she is, and which weapon and clue are the right ones (with 6 or more players, there’s also an “Accomplice”).  The wrinkle is that none of the Investigators knows which player the Assassin is (there’s a ritual at the beginning of every round involving closing and opening eyes and raising of thumbs), and the Assassin tries to blend in with the rest of the Investigators and throw them off the scent.   Much deduction, arguing, intrigue, play-acting, etc. ensue.  On Christmas Eve, while I cooked roast pork and red cabbage, Lydia and the kids played one game in the kitchen which exploded in riotous shrieks and laughter when Sarah, who had been feigning anger that her sisters were ignoring her clues, was revealed as the Assassin.  We also played some Fury of Dracula, another game where one player is Dracula and the other players pursue him all over Europe (good for one’s eastern European geography), and Dead of Winter, another outstanding and tense co-operative game, because it wouldn't be Christmas without a zombie apocalypse.    

On the 26^th, I drove the girls to the airport for their flight back to Boston.  We exchanged misty-eyed hugs at security.  I was sad to see them leave, but brimming with joy and gratitude for the time we had spent together.

Later that evening I learned that, on Christmas Day, a woman I work with killed herself and her two young children, ages 4 and 1 ½.  The three of them were found on the sidewalk in front of a parking garage tower near Northeastern University in Boston.  Her SUV, doors open, child seats inside, was found on the top floor.  The news reports called this a “murder/suicide,” which I suppose is technically correct, but those terms didn’t make it any easier to process what had happened.

I found myself asking questions about the mundane details of the day itself, an exercise that becomes more horrific and heartbreaking the deeper you go.  Was there something playing on the car radio as she drove over?  Did she say anything to the kids on the way, perhaps a story to put their minds at ease, knowing what the real purpose of her trip was?  Did they talk about the toys that Santa had brought that morning?  As she circled up the parking garage ramp, the parked cars on each floor becoming sparser as she climbed, did she have second thoughts?  When she exited her car on the garage roof, did the cold brace of air on her face trigger a moment, however fleeting, of consideration?  Did she say anything to her children, a brief word of comfort or love, while leading them to the roof’s edge? 

Morbid curiosity like this is at worst fuel for sensational media coverage and gossip, and at best an irrational rescue fantasy.  As if by mentally inserting myself into the horrible moments leading up to their deaths, perhaps I may say or do something to change the outcome.

There is no “sense” to be made here.  None of the “motive” cards in Deception: Hong Kong ("Power," "Money," "Jealousy") remotely capture whatever might lead a human being to such an act.  Talking about brain chemistry and mental health awareness only gets you so far.  As I try to process this, I find myself retreating to broad, somewhat clumsy theological terms.  There are seeds of both immense light and utter darkness within every single one of us.  And darkness, from within or without, can overwhelm the strongest of us.  I do believe, based on faith and experience and probably my own good fortune, that light does prevail in the end, and I pray that this is an idea I will be able to hang onto whenever I may find myself surrounded by darkness in the future.  One never knows.

Last Sunday at church, the opening prayer talked about the new year, and about how being in church offers hope, comfort, strength, and vision as we make resolutions about who we will be and how we will live.  Near the end, our minister Laurence talked about “not taking refuge in a cozy personal faith,” something that I think I (along with a lot of so-called Christians) are susceptible to.  It’s convenient for me to chalk up the horrors of Christmas Day in Boston to the metaphysical struggle between good and evil, light and darkness.  That way, I can put my mind at relative ease, and we can all get back to work.  It’s another thing entirely to testify to that light: to try to, however humbly, be a source of light for other human beings.

James 2:14-18 is worth thinking about, when it comes to making January resolutions:

“What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead." 

Autumn Leaves / Late Capitalism

from October 20, 2019 – Cambridge, MA

Writing is wonderful because it forces you to pay attention (i.e., appreciate) things, and because, through the act of writing about your experience of something, it becomes in some ways richer and more concrete.

Writing is also awful because all the richness and complexity and mystery of experience is crammed into the confined space of one’s writing ability and vocabulary.

* * * *

The Geneva 20k is in a couple of weeks, and today I ran the last of my long runs (13 miles) before “tapering” which I’m not sure if you’re supposed to do for a 20k like you do for a marathon, but which is the best part of training for a marathon, so I’m allowing myself to taper.  I left the apartment around 8am, after the sun had risen and the temperature had warmed up a bit. 

This weekend is the Head of the Charles regatta, or I should say the BNY Mellon Head of the Charles, as it’s now sponsored by a bank, or, per its website, “The Investments Company for the World (sic?).”  There wasn’t much evidence that anything special was going on up near the Longfellow Bridge, but as I moved west of Mass Ave and the river started narrowing, the telltale signs of the “Head of the Chuck” started to appear.  A village of sponsors’ tents: Yakima roof racks, Peet’s Coffee, food trucks including something calling itself the “Butter’d Lobster Experience,” and, gilding the lily, Brooks Brothers.  Middle-aged couples wearing worn baseball caps and sunglasses, torsos warmed by fleece and goose down.  I lost count of the number of school lacrosse jackets I saw – each with lax sticks crossed above the wearer’s heart.  Exeter, Dartmouth, a few schools I hadn’t heard of but had compounded names (i.e., “The X and Y School”) which sounded old and rich.

The Head of the Charles is known in some circles as the signature autumn event in Boston, and today was tailor-made: leaves in golden mid-explosion, crisp air warmed by acutely angled rays of sunlight.  Part of me can appreciate and enjoy all this, and applaud the kids in the boats, rowing away, working as a team, etc.  But the symbolism here hits you dead in the face: a celebration of (overwhelmingly white) wealth and power, cheering itself on as the next generation straps itself in (facing backward) to the vessels that will carry them along the calm waters, while they execute repetitive, uncreative motions to power the machine. 

By the time I got back to the Mass Ave Bridge, they were preparing for the “8s,” and the wide part of the river was dappled with dozens of boats.  From a small inflatable dinghy out in the middle of the river, a woman with a bullhorn was trying to keep them all organized in the staging areas as they approached the starting line.  The sight of all those boats on the water was truly impressive, in the way that I imagine the ships approaching Normandy on D-Day must have been.

Breakfast in Paradise

I slept all the way to my alarm at 6am, which is somewhat unusual with the time difference, but an almost perfect execution of my MO for westbound transatlantic travel: ~2 hours of sleep on the plane, and then 5-6 (in this case, 6.5) hours here.  Even more unusual was my resisting the pull to blearily scroll through the iPhone (other than a quick check to see if Lydia had sent me a message overnight; she hadn’t, perhaps unconsciously knowing my intentions not to look at it).  Instead I got out of bed, opened the blinds to the still darkness over the construction site out the north window,¹ and retrieved from the fridge the bowl of oats and chia seeds and dates and cocoa and almond milk that I had stirred together the night before, loosely following a recipe from the latest Gwyneth Paltrow cookbook we bought on eBay.² 

Appropriate that the chapter of Merton’s Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander that I read over breakfast talks about the dawn: “Here is an unspeakable secret: paradise is all around us and we do not understand.  It is wide open.  The sword is taken away, but we do not know it; we are off ‘one to his farm and another to his merchandise.’  Lights on.  Clocks ticking.  Thermostats working.  Stoves cooking.  Electric shavers filling radios with static.  ‘Wisdom,’ cries the dawn deacon, but we do not attend.”

This followed a passage in which Merton describes the daybreak at his hermitage at Gesthemani: mainly the first cries of the waking birds, at “the most wonderful moment of the day…when creation in its innocence asks permission to ‘be’ once again.”  In my case, the role of the birds would be played by the construction workers, emerging from the darkness in neon safety vests, porting hardhats and lahge coffees from Dunkin’.  They’re here as part the tsunami of biotech gentrification which continues to crash tirelessly over this part of Cambridge, so they (and certainly I) would technically fall more on the side of merchandise than wisdom, in Merton’s terms.  Still, I also find this the most wonderful moment of the day, and in the rhythm of their walk and the hum and grind of the machines and the black/blue sky I think I still catch at least glimpse of paradise.    

¹ Both windows in this apartment face north, so probably a useless qualification

² I know how this sounds, but trust me her cookbooks are really good

The Last Annual Absolute Ceiling Business Traveler's Buyer's Guide

A few months ago while thumbing through the New York Times app, I saw a headline for “The Best Gear for Travel 2019.”  Given the direction of this here website, you would think something like that would interest me, but instead I experienced a vague sense of unease. 

Perhaps it was the deflated feeling that comes with the realization that the New York Times, the sober organ that weighed down the breakfast tables of my youth with its keen reportage and dense black typeset, has become just another shill for Corporate America.  Then again, the NYT has become more and more unreadable over the past several years, so I think that particular ship may have already sailed.

Perhaps it was the use of the word “gear” in the headline, implying that the reader is preparing to hike the Appalachian Trail, when most likely she’s just headed to a conference room at a Marriott somewhere.  Of course, this kind of strategy has been used effectively for years to peddle sport-utility vehicles to soccer moms, and these headline writers know their craft. 

Or perhaps it was the implication that the inconvenience and anxiety of traveling can be overcome, or at least neutralized, through the acquisition and utilization of stuff.  “If only I had the right pair of travel underwear,” the thinking goes, “then I would be able to endure the hell that is five and a half hours in a middle seat on Delta.” 

I wonder to what extent this is about control, or rather the illusion of control – the idea that if I can somehow create an environment more comfortable, convenient, productive, and/or pleasurable, it might obviate the fact that I’m trapped here inside a metal tube, hurtling 37,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean, completely at the mercy of the human beings who designed, manufactured, assembled, maintained, refueled, and are flying the metal tube.  By the way, these days many of those tubes are not made of metal but mostly of “CFRP,” or carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic, a tidbit of knowledge which does nothing to quell that particular anxiety.

In any case.  I suppose we all need certain illusions to keep us sane and functional.  Also I figure if I name-drop a few companies in here it might help my site traffic.  Thus:

The Last Annual Absolute Ceiling Business Traveler Buyer’s Guide

Bose QuietComfort 3 Over-Ear Noise-Cancelling Headphones, $350*, www.bose.com

One of the main points of this website, if not the main point, is to try to be more aware and present while traveling for work.  Thus I feel somewhat conflicted recommending that you go isolate yourself underneath a pair of noise-cancelling headphones.  Yet sometimes when on a plane or train one does want to catch a movie or enjoy a podcast, and the flimsy earbuds in plastic wrapping they distribute in economy fall short when it comes to audio quality and ear canal comfort.

I bought my pair of Bose headphones around 2006, and, apart from the leather-ish ear cushions which have eroded down to the bare fabric, they work just as well today.  The power system – involving a small custom battery which detaches from one of the earphones and clicks into an external plug-in charger, and which miraculously I haven’t forgotten in a hotel room somewhere – is a little fiddly, but it still holds a charge just fine, and it’s remained immune from extinction via the evolutionary “advance” of plugs and cables over the years.

So thanks and praise to the good people at Bose for resisting the strategy of planned obsolescence.  I like my MacBook as much as you like yours, but when the Genius at the Cambridgeside Apple Store informs me that the one I bought in 2010 is “like, vintage,” and that therefore it would be actually cheaper for me to buy a new MacBook (which of course comes with a next generation USB-C port, meaning I also need to buy an adapter if I want to plug anything into it) rather than get my old one repaired, I know what time it is.

Unfortunately, and speaking of Apple, I find that I don’t use my headphones to listen to music as much as I used to.  I think this began around 2016, when I started subscribing to their Apple Music streaming service.  In some ways this has been a good thing: I can now listen to a lot more new music and see how I feel about an unfamiliar act before plunking down $12.99 for an album based only on faith or a suspiciously high Metacritic score.  I still do buy the occasional album via iTunes, mainly because I spend a lot of time on airplanes and I want to be able to listen to them while offline.  But generally I use Apple Music as it was designed, streaming the songs via an Internet connection.  And I’m sure that Apple is betting that those remaining few islands of non-connectivity will soon be swallowed by the rising waters of ubiquitous wifi, and that the quaint act of “listening offline” will go the way of the cassette tape.   Still, I’m not sure how comfortable I feel about this whole thing.  Does “renting” rather than “owning” music change my relationship to it?  To what extent do I want to define myself by my record collection?  And what happens when my “record collection” evaporates into a bunch of server farms in the desert, only accessible to me for as long as I keep sending money to Cupertino, CA?   To what extent does a third-party mediator influence my relationship with music, and the artist responsible for it?  Of course, all the recorded music I’ve listened to my entire life has been delivered via some kind of mediator, whether it’s a record label or a radio station or Jack’s Music Shop in Red Bank, NJ.  Still, when the artist/listener relationship starts to drift towards the transient, the transactional, and especially the conditional, I’m not sure that takes us in a good direction. 

And, what do you know: Apple announced in June that it will be shutting down its iTunes software, replacing it with “three all-new apps that greatly simplify and improve the way Mac users discover and enjoy their favorite music, TV shows, movies and podcasts.”   Don’t worry, Apple assures us, users will still have access to their entire music libraries.  We shall see. 

Maybe I’m overreacting here.  Or maybe I’m not.

* Bose doesn’t sell this model anymore, so this is an estimated price for an analogous new pair.

Freitag HAZZARD Backpack, CHF340, https://www.freitag.ch/en/f303

Choosing a bag for your work things can be complicated.  To begin with, there's no consensus on what one should call it these days: “briefcase” is out of style; “backpacks” are for schoolchildren; one is left with the generic “work bag,” which sounds moronic and soulless.  Whatever you call it, it should be functional yet portable, practical yet at least a little stylish. So what are our choices?  The traditional rectangular leather attaché with latches that could be sprung open dramatically in a courtroom seems to have reached extinction.  In my 20’s I had a brown leather “messenger bag,” but those things tend to be pretty heavy and un-ergonomic: my former boss once told me (with a disconcerting hint of pride) that one of her shoulders had become several centimeters lower after years of humping a bag like this from one airport to another.  In the US, one sees a lot of logoed hiking-style backpacks (Ogio seems to have cornered the market on these).  I suppose all those zippered compartments are handy, but they tend to encourage over-stuffing, and the Americans tend to make matters worse by dangling water bottles, hand sanitizer, mini-stuffed animals, carabiners (?) and other bric-a-brac from exterior loops.  On the other end of the spectrum, a friend of mine tells me he’s managed to strip down, Kondo-esque, to a single, sleek neoprene laptop sleeve, which I can only admire longingly.

My Frietag backpack has a polarizing effect on my colleagues.  The Germans all tend to like it.  The Swiss are nonplussed, as you can’t swing a cat in Zurich or Bern without hitting half a dozen Frietag bags.  The Americans are a little confused but tolerant.  And every single one of my French coworkers hates it.  To wit, this exchange with my colleague Eric:

Eric: “Tom, when is your birthday?”

Me (eyebrows raised in pleasant surprise): “My birthday?  Why, it’s September 2^nd.”

Eric: “Good.  I will buy you a new backpack so I don’t have to look at that ugly thing anymore.”

I admit that CHF 340 is steep, but Frietags have a lot going for them.  They make all their bags out of the tarpaulin-like material which they recycle from the side of container trucks.  On top of the ecological benefits (many Frietag bags also use recycled seat belts for their shoulder straps), this also means it’s waterproof, it will probably last forever, and the design and color of each bag are unique, in a “found art” kind of way.  It’s certainly not going to get mistaken for someone else’s bag going through security.  Frietag also has a cool website with stop-motion-animations of their products, starring the people who work in their factory.  If you find yourself in Zurich, go check out their flagship store, which, on-brand, is made up of repurposed shipping containers.

Mivolis Meerwasser Nasenspray, €1.45, www.dm.de

A doctor told me once that no one would ever get colds if they used saline nasal spray every day during the winter.  I don’t know about that, but airplane cabins are pretty dry, and this seems to help.  My in-laws like to bring me these when they visit. 

FALKE RUN Socks, €15, www.falke.com, (they also have a great store in the Munich airport)

I’m aware that there’s a need for self-expression, or even self-definition, going on here.  We want things which will not only make our travels easier and more enjoyable, but which will also say something about us to the guy sitting across the aisle.  I can admit that at least part of my own motivation here is contrarian, as if waving around my German nasal spray is somehow going to make me more interesting / unique / better than your average American pharmaceutical executive.

The same could likely be said about these socks from FALKE, an outfit out of Schmallenberg, Germany, which has been making quality “legwear” (their word) since 1895.  In fact, the FALKE people are already several steps ahead of me when it comes to brand-as-self, as evidenced by their website: “The FALKE scene* is made up of multilingual globetrotters, headstrong individuals, curious explorers, fanatical perfectionists, sensitive creative types and incorrigible aesthetes.  Their imagery, their interior design and their clothing are visible expressions of their instincts.”   This is what Brits in the advertising trade would call a “pen portrait.”  Remember we’re talking about socks here. 

In any case, these socks are truly fabulous.  Soft and cushiony but not too thick, left/right customized so they don’t bunch up around the pinkie toe, with just enough elastic to grip your feet and ankles without strangling them.  I suppose you could run in them, as the name implies, but they’re perfectly fine with a pair of trainers or casual shoes.

* “scene!”

Eric Bompard Cashmere Hoodie, €395, www.eric-bompard.com

Okay, I suppose no one really needs a cashmere hoodie.  But the cabin temperature on an overnight transatlantic typically fluctuates +/- 20F degrees, so this comes in especially handy during the winter months.  When I’m home and the outside temperature is 40F or below, I wear mine essentially every waking hour, so from a cost/utility point of view, it’s probably one of the cheapest things I own. 

Olive Tree Bible Study App, free, www.olivetree.com

I’ve been at this – trying to write about business travel and God and things – for two years now, and I find that it doesn’t get any easier.  On the contrary: paths between various destinations become worn and familiar; the urge to execute the rituals of business travel – transferring electronics and liquids from bag to security bins back to bag with maximum speed and efficiency – draw our attention inward.  It takes more and more effort and discipline to appreciate one’s experience, to try to observe the sacrament of the present moment.    

With this in mind, I try (and I fail, a lot) to spend as much time as possible not looking at my phone when I’m traveling. To try to avoid that blurry, strung-out state when you’re mindlessly scrolling through Twitter, not even recording half of the words traversing your screen, trying to capture something you can’t quite identify and also know you’ll never actually find.       

Of course, if there’s an app that makes your life easier when you’re on the road, then by all means use it.  Likewise, if a piece of “gear” will make you a little more comfortable in your travels, go for it.  But while you’re at it, try to take a moment to weave in something that is more than just a dopamine fix.  Talk to a stranger.  Read and think about a Bible verse if that’s your thing.  Look up and admire the ceiling architecture.  Call a friend you haven’t talked to in a while.  Close your eyes and say a prayer of thanks to the divinity of your choice, or to none at all.