Brooklyn @25 (belated)

[XMASTIME NOTE] I moved to Brooklyn 25 years ago this past January; throughout the year I'll be noting things, no matter how small they are in reality, that I remember & associate with those first few days/weeks/months of living in the greatest city in the world.

I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to love this record when it came out; I’d spent the previous 5+ years defending the band against “fans” calling them sellouts because god forbid they sell a few records after slogging it out for an entire decade. I loved Let Your Dim Light Shine, the follow-up to their smash hit album Grave Dancers Union, so I held out hopes that this new album would surprise me with how great it was.

It did not.

It has a few songs that are pretty good, some that are terrible and a lot of “meh” in between. I saw them twice on this tour, the first time they really pushed the record but by the second time they'd stopped bothering to play it and it was a like a greatest hits night, and they fucking cranked. I remember meeting Pirner and being surprised how tall he was.🤷‍♂️ So it’s not a great album, or a good one, and I’ve rarely thought of it since then but whenever I do, I'm brought right back to those days at 232 Ainslie Street with Rrthur (YES ladies, THAT Rrthur) and Mrs. Rrthur, fresh from moving to Brooklyn USA with everything & nothing in front of me all at once.

Here's a clip from their appearance on VH1 the same night I was introduced to this Ani Difranco classic.