I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: STEVE GUNN-Plays Between the Ties of an Abandoned Railroad (Field Recordings, October 12, 2016).

I don’t know Steve Gunn and I am surprised to see that he has released fourteen albums and has worked with Kurt Vile.

For this Field Recording, Gunn headed out to the woods to play three beautiful songs.

 In Forest Park, Queens, N.Y., an old relic suits Gunn’s sound. The Long Island Railroad’s Rockaway Beach Branch used to run through the park. It’s been abandoned for over a half-century, and trees have grown between the ties, skewing the rails and jarring the lines. Late this past summer, Gunn stood on the tracks of this worn American symbol and sang three songs off his latest album — songs about meandering, home and the crooked paths that take us wherever we’re meant to be.

Once again I am really impressed by the quality of the sound.  His guitar is absolutely clear and his voice is perfectly mic’d, but you can also hear ambient sounds–birds and such–making this recording unique.

Gunn has a pretty picking style (using thumb and fingers independently to get strums and picked notes simultaneously).  This enables him to keep the song moving forward while he plays the pretty guitar melodies.

“Full Moon Tide” has a great melody and a delightful chorus.

He walks further into the woods to play “Night Wander.”  It has a kind of circular feel in which the chorus feels like a part of the verse.  I’d say that Gunn’s voice is nothing special, but I like the deeper resonances he gets on this song.

For the final song, “Ark” he walks further down the tracks to a bridge.  Whether it is having the surface above him or just the style of his playing, this song feels warmer, and quite different from the others.

It’s a great introduction to this excellent guitarist.

[READ: January 9, 2017] “The Apartment”

This story is a fascinating look at a woman convincing herself that something must be true.

The apartment across from hers has been vacant for sometime–since the woman living there died.  But recently there was movement inside.  The person’s last name was Jahani.

Louise knew a man named Jahani when she was studying at Stockholm University.  Arman Jahani was the second man she’d slept with (her husband Martin was the first).  Martin, did not know about Arman.

While she is having lunch (sushi) with her adult son Jonas, she intersperses his conversation with memories of Arman.  The two most resonating thoughts are that he died in the early nineties and was survived by a son and a daughter.  Or so she believed.

She tells Jonas that the vacant apartment has been filled.  Jonas hasn’t lived at home for quite some time.  He wasn’t there when the woman died.  “You can;t imagine the smell” she tells him.  It was actually her husband who discovered her and was shocked that no one has mentioned the smell.

After lunch, she headed back home, but not before stopping off at Systembolaget to buy some wine.  She never went to the same place twice in a row–she didn’t want anyone to know what she bought.

She begins drinking the wine and then thinks about the other neighbors.  A month before her son was born, a different neighbor had asked Louise to babysit her son.  Louise didn’t feel well, so she volunteered her husband to babysit for her.  But Martin came back after an hour.  He had left the child alone and said he was tired and had not brought a book to read.  She was appalled that he left the boy alone.  He went into his studio and settled in to read,.

When Louise found out she was pregnant, she feared that Arman might be the father.  She broke it off with Arman, and was relieved to see that the conception date didn’t match to her last time with him.  But she wasn’t fully relieved until the baby was born.

By the time the girl entered the apartment below, Louise had drunk most of the bottle of wine.  She decided to introduce herself.

Louise is polite and the girl, Sara, is happy to have the welcome.  Sara finds the welcome a little awkward when Louise gives her cookies.  And then she begins saying strange things.

The story ends with Louise heading back home where she tries to confront some things.