I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: JIMMY EAT WORLD-Tiny Desk Concert #939 (January 29, 2020).

I’ll never understand the logistics of the Tiny Desk Concert setup.

This Concert features Jimmy Eat World, an unarguably huge band (at one time at least).  They’re doing something cool–playing their songs acoustically with no drums.

And they play for … less than 12 minutes.

Meanwhile the previous Tiny Desk Concert was by a young reggae person who, while she won a Grammy, is certainly not as well known or regarded as Jimmy Eat World.  And she got 15 minutes.  I’m okay with bands that I like playing a short set, it’s just frustrating that so many bands that I don’t know–usually in genres I don’t like as much–get two and sometimes three times as much air time.

But whatever.   Maybe the bands don’t want to play for that long.  But Jimmy Eat World came for their Tiny Desk Concert looking to have fun.

Jimmy Eat World showed up to the NPR Music office all smiles and no guitars, goofing off with toy instruments behind the Tiny Desk and cracking jokes. They borrowed a couple acoustics, a miniature gong and tambourine emblazoned with Bob Boilen’s face, which set the tone for a slightly silly, but altogether gracious performance.

They open with “Love Never” which features Jim Adkins singing lead and Robin Vining singing harmony.  I never noticed how fantastic their harmonies are–they are really spot on.  I wonder if it’s more noticeable in this stripped down format (or maybe it’s because Vining is a touring member and was picked because his voice is amazing).

What’s really funny during this song is that drummer Zach Lind is standing behind them the whole time doing nothing. And then for the last note, he hits Bob Boilen’s gong.  It’s pretty funny and everyone cracks up.

The next song, “All the Way (Stay)” comes from the band’s tenth album, Surviving.  [They have been around for twenty-seven years!].  Zach plays the tambourine.   Again, the vocal harmonies are outstanding as Robin picks out the melody while Jim strums.

Introducing the final song, Jim says their new songs reflect their earlier song ideas: “Your sense of self-worth coming from external validation is an empty pursuit,”

Guitarist Tom Linton joins the band for the final song.  During the introduction, Adkins gets distracted by Tom’s guitar (and goofs about throat singing) before getting everyone super excited that they’re going to play “The Middle.”

I’m fascinated to realize that I’ve known this song for nearly 30 years.  It’s still fun to sing along to–which the audience does.

this feel-good Bleed American single has remained a constant source of goodness in a sometimes bleak world. When the audience joins in for the last chorus, an uplifting catharsis streaked through our hearts as we all sang, “Everything, everything will be just fine / Everything, everything will be all right, all right.”

I’m always thrilled when bands like this get a Tiny Desk and I hope there’s more to come!

[READ: February 1, 2020] Rust Volume 1

Volume 1 picks up right where the prologue left off.  We are at Roman Taylor’s farm.  Roman is typing a letter to his (deceased?) father.  He says that mom is doing good and the little ones are fine. He hopes little Oswald will stick round, he could sure use help on the farm.

Then he tells about Jet Jones.

How on the day he arrived, Jet came screaming through the sky like he’d been shot out of a cannon.  He crashed through the barn and into the field.   When Roman went to look at him he heard a sound coming from behind the barn.   It was a large machine, clearly on a mission

The machine grabbed the boy and hurled him into a tree–which snapped in half.

Roman confesses to his father that he wanted to stop the machine not because it was the right thing to do, but because wanted to harness the machine’s power.

When Roman runs over the boy, he is stunned to see that the boy is still a live.  Jet hatches a plan to disable the giant robot.  It will take some help from Roman and after a brutal battle, Roman succeeds in burning out the creature’s engine.

Jet believes that he is responsible for the damaged barn and tractor (and he is), so he offers to stick around to fix it.  He causes all kinds of confusion among the family, especially young Oswald.  Jet looks like a boy but he claims to have been a in a war that Roman’s grandfather was in.

It was during this war that people decided to create robots to fight.

Jet sees Roman working on the machine a Model-C.  Jet asks if Roman is going to resurrect a killing machine.  But Roman says he can re-code it to be productive around the farm.

In an interesting domestic situation, the littlest girl Amy has a best friend Ava, who is blind (the way the characters blindness is drawn is fantastic).  Roman offers to bring Ava home to her grandfather when dinner is over.

Ava’s grandfather has heard that Jet is staying there and he advises that the sooner Jet leaves the better …that kid’s got history.

Turns out the grandfather was a lieutenant during the war and he signed papers to never talk about anything he saw or did in the war.  There were experimental machines designed to replace the soldiers.  They did not need orders or guns.

While the grandfather is talking his other granddaughter, Jesse, comes out.  She is happy yo see Roman and says she is going to the city to check out a school.  She knows that she can’t farm alone and her grandfather is getting too old, so she needs to learn to do something.

On her way out, Jesse gets into a car accident with a humanoid.  The humanoid is a robot (the kind her grandfather was describing).  It was headed toward Roman’s farm.  Luckily (we guess) she incapacitated it.

What a great cliffhanger for Volume 2.

The end pages of the book include some photos that Royden took of old farm equipment.  The sepia pictures work really well with the rusted sepia tone of the illustrations.