Greetings From Ys-burry Park.

Ooh Ooh Ooh! The other day we got the new Joanna Newsom ep. A couple of weeks before it comes out. Oh the benefits of having a girlfriend who's a music editor for a local magazine.

So, it's fantastic. Having been lucky enough to see Newsom live on her recent tour, I was floored by her full band arrangements of songs from Ys. At the time of the concert, I hadn't bought the album yet. So, the show kinda colored how I approached the album after I got it. (Directly after the show). As amazing as Ys is, the full band arrangements were something else entirely. The Ys Street Band, as she refers to them, make the songs sound even more Renaissance Fair-y, but that doesn't really faze me. I could see how this could disarm someone not willing to go along with the whole Sword In The Stone vibe of this ep. The thing that gets me is Newsom herself. She's amazing. Her lyrics are labyrinths that are very easy to get lost in, beautiful labyrinths, with all the amenities of home. A labyrinth that I don't mind settling down in, making a pot of coffee, letting the exit come to me.

I miss that show, there are certain bands whose shows reach this level that you don't ever want them to end. You want to live at these shows, you want to become familiar with the corners and hallways of the shows. Using the settling in metaphor again, I guess. It's where you want to be. Not like a Dead or Phish concert thing, where you just go, get fucked up, and appreciate the music much more while you're tripping and making grilled cheese sandwiches in the parking lot. No, more like following Joanna Newsom to watch this house that she's building get windows, a roof. Later on, couches, cats, and microwaves.

And that brings me to how much I already miss Kings. It was a place where you could watch a band do that. We were really lucky to have a couple of beyond fantastic bands that built a house in Kings. The Rosebuds were starting to put pictures of children (The Bowerbirds) on the walls of their house. Amanda and I were talking the other day, and we realized that we've seen the Rosebuds more than we've seen any band in our life. Probably a half dozen drummers, a stand up bass player once, now a full band. We've all been lucky in this town, able to watch this little band grow up into this big thing that they are now. I don't know how many people get to do that. Watch a good band become great, in front of you, three or four miles down the road.