New Music, New Adventures 2025 #9
Stripped-down pop and getting ready for the road
We’ve got just a couple of days to go before starting our drive back to the Midwest. Our remaining days have been spent with some local friends here in Palm Springs such as Steve and Pete who invited us over for dinner and a screening of Oscar winner Anora. Of course, Frank and I had already seen but it was great to watch again as this year’s big winner.
We also had the great joy of seeing Chicago based cabaret singer Becky Menzie at an intimate theater in town with Frank’s college friends Bill, Dave, and Richard. Frank and I have seen Menzie several times in our 35 years together. When she’d asked for requests, we’d always shout out, “Gypsies, Tramps, & Thieves!” As if, THAT is a standard cabaret song SHE would sin! She’d always jokingly start playing it though. It was great to see her again and, yes, she did remember us but didn’t sing the Cher classic that night. However, what she and her co-singer did was sing some beautifully stripped-down versions of Billboard chart hits. It really made me feel the basic pleasures of those songs and the need to hear more of my favorites in similar subdued settings. Having a gin martini to go along with it makes the experience even better.
Other events this week included a night out for dinner with Marco and Elise and seeing an excellent local production of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying at its first night of previews with our good friends Jim, Loren, Steve, & Pete.
It was also great to have a final bike ride before heading back where the weather may or may not cooperate for rides until mid-April.
Every week I write about the songs that are new to my weekly Top Ten (obviously some drop out but they remain on my 2025 playlist.) It’s interesting how many relate to what is happening to me each week and whatever is going on inside my head. This week is no exception.
New Music from Contemporary Artists that Everyone Should Check Out:
Back on the Road – Half Moon Run
These guys have made my end of the year Top Ten twice, in 2020 with Jello on My Mind and in 2023 with Hotel in Memphis. I’m a fan of their laid-back delivery and clever, introspective lyrics. Back on the Road is a new track that hits me right now as I keep thinking about that long upcoming cross-country drive. Here are the key opening lyrics:
“I am getting into some things that I can't quite work out
It's like I'm a lone passenger on a twenty-ton ship that's been run aground
And if that's the way I am gonna characterize it
I better get myself back on the road”
I’ve truly loved my time here in Palm Springs but I’m ready to go back to my real home, get going on some home projects, and see some of my other friends and neighbors.
Going Home – OK Go
This indie rock band, originally from Chicago, has been around for over 25 years. However, they’ve never made a dent in my own regular listening save for a couple of songs from their 2015 album Hungry Ghosts. They’ve made some great videos for their many up-tempo tracks but Going Home features a decidedly different sound from what I’ve come to expect. It’s from an upcoming album called And the Adjacent Possible. Like the Half Moon Run track this one kicks it back for a quiet contemplation about feeling a bit empty but it’s okay because “I’m going home…”
Lights on the Way – Rose City Band
This is the second track from Rose City Band’s album Sol Y Sombra that I’ve gotten attached to this year. (Coincidently, the album’s title is the name of a restaurant a block away from where we’ve been staying just outside the border of Palm Springs.) The bouncy tune has some deceptively dark lyrics about how the “shadows fall,” “crawling home,” and being “lost along the way.” But it’s possible to “catch the breeze” “wish upon another star” with “lights on the way in the cold and the rain” and soon being “home again.” Somewhere in my crazed mind, those words also ring true at this moment in time.
I Can’t Imagine (Why You Feel This Way) – Sharon Van Etten
Several tracks from Sharon Van Etten’s latest, Sharon Van Etten and The Attachment Theory, have been bubbling for me in the last few weeks. This one caught me with its irresistible arrangement and production. Given the current political climate these lyrics also seem quite relevant:
“We heard about it on the news today
It's hard to listen what they have to say
Turn it up, to turn it down”
And
“We don't need to stay here forever
We're nothing but a world away”
Is it possible to be somewhere as idyllic as Palm Springs and stay clear of the darkness happening in the country? I think we’ve done it for the past three months but “we don’t need to stay here forever.”
Back on the road…
Link to my 2025 Playlist:
Which songs have hit you this week? New adventures?
Safe travels home!
Not a new adventure per se, but I am chomping at the bit to get my bike out tomorrow (Friday). Supposed to be almost 70!