#I actually have no idea who is Neil’s god parent is so suggestions are welcomed lol

[ryah-wolfe]

I’ve read the first Percy Jackson book for the first time and this crossover came to mind. I only know PJ universe through a quick and vague wiki search, so sorry if this is inaccurate.

The Foxhole Court x Percy Jackson and The Olympians

The message came in a sealed scroll, all formal and shit, asking for aid. Wymack wanted to burn the damned thing. But he knew a war between the immortals meant his foxes -his kids- would be dragged in anyways. Chiron asked for peace talks, wanting a reconciliation between the main camp and its runoff.

Most modern demigods are born for the modern aspects of their Godly parent, some kids though, are born from war for war. Their godly blood boiling in their bodies. Making them volatile, and perfect when in ancient times, there was always enemy forces that need slaying but in these times of peace? It made them more likely to lash out at those around them. Most burn up before hitting their teens, their blood consuming them. The few who make it to Camp Half-blood end up being sent away, being too dangerous to be around the other campers.

Chiron asked to send an envoy to Palmetto Academy.

Dan- daughter of Nike

Matt- son of Dionysius

Allison- daughter of Athena

Seth- son of Ares

Renee- daughter of Iris (edit: I can’t believe I forgot her)

Nicky- son of Aphrodite

Aaron- son of Apollo

Andrew- son of Apollo

Kevin- Won’t Say

Neil- unclaimed (favorited by Hermes)

[badacts]

kid kevin’s first christmas 🎄

Neil is falling asleep beside Andrew on the couch when he suddenly sits bolt upright and says, “Christmas!”

Andrew doesn’t look up from his book. “I know you said you would swear less now, but I presume that isn’t your idea of an alternative.”

“No,” Neil splutters, pointing at the television that is only on for murmuring background noise. The screen is a mess of coloured lights, fake snow and festive music. “It’s nearly Christmas.”

“Your point?” Andrew enquires. It’s the twentieth of December, so Neil isn’t wrong, but he doesn’t know what that has to do with them.

“Kevin,” Neil says. “We should do something.”

“Kevin is ten months old. What would you suggest we do, exactly?” Andrew points out. Kevin may be pretty advanced for his age, according to the internet – he’s taken his first wobbly steps after a very brief period of crawling, and he has a couple of words, notably ‘Da’ and ‘no’ – but he has no concept of Christmas. 

And frankly, Andrew and Neil only have slightly more of a concept. Andrew doesn’t have many good holiday memories from growing up, and Neil never observed a single one until he went to college. These days, they technically celebrate some kind of bastardised winter holiday, though mostly it’s family, friends, and dubiously festive food.

Last year, Nicky made cupcakes that looked like snowmen and Andrew and Aaron didn’t fight, which is the best they’ve done collectively so far.

“We should get a tree,” Neil says, with a kind of fervour he usually reserves for Exy and, well, things related to Kevin. 

“Fine,” Andrew says, because he knows a lost cause when he sees one.

Neil nearly cries when he goes to the mall on December 23rd. At least half of that is because Kevin takes one look at the crowds of people everywhere and shrieks like a tiny demon.

Neil is thankful that he did up the straps holding Kevin in his stroller nice and tight. It means he can pretend to be deaf without worrying about Kevin squirming out onto the floor.

He’s pushing the stroller in front of him and dragging a shopping cart behind him with a fake Christmas tree in it when a woman in her fifties stops him to tell him, “You’re doing great, Dad.”

She doesn’t even look concerned when Neil turns a wild-eyed look on her – apparently that’s normal with parents. She just gives him an encouraging and somewhat pitying smile. He can’t believe he’s at a point in his life where random middle-aged people feel sorry for him instead of crossing the street to stay away from him.

As soon as she goes and takes her shopping cart with her, Neil pulls out his phone and dials Andrew’s number.

“Here,” he tells both of them when Andrew answers, shoving the phone in Kevin’s grasping hands. Kevin pulls the phone closer and squawks into it, and Neil hears Andrew’s calm voice murmur, “Hello, Kevin.”

After that the noise from the stroller is limited to Kevin’s usual babbling and fractured syllables. Neil doesn’t take the phone back until he’s paid for the things in his cart and got out to the parking lot.

“I’m done,” he tells Andrew, tucking the phone between his ear and his shoulder so he can get Kevin free of the stroller and into his carseat. Kevin is tired now, protesting being moved by clinging to Neil while he fiddles with too many straps.

“Congrats,” Andrew says boredly. Neil hangs up on him.

Kevin sleeps the whole way home, and wakes up exceptionally grumpy when they pull in. The only advantage is that Neil can pass him off to Andrew to deal with while he unloads the rest of the car.

He puts the tree up while Kevin is napping. It’s only four feet tall but a pretty dark green, and the tinsel and decorations look surprisingly good. It’s not a bad first attempt.

Also, the quiet amazement on Kevin’s face when he sees the lights go on after he wakes up is worth it.

Usually they rotate the place they meet for the winter holidays, but this year everyone is coming to them even though it’s technically Aaron and Katelyn’s turn to host. This is good, mostly because Neil can’t think of anything much worse than air travel with a baby and Andrew at the same time.

Nicky sweeps in wearing a Christmas sweater that even Neil can recognise as ugly, a more soberly dressed Erik in his wake. “Hello, hello! Kevin! Oh my god, he’s even cuter in real life, Neil!”

Kevin, who is used to Andrew and Neil’s moderate presences, looks shell-shocked by this level of enthusiasm. He promptly shuffles behind Andrew’s legs, hand stuffed in his mouth.

Nicky immediately softens, his face helplessly charmed. “Oh, a shy one. I see how it is.”

“He’ll warm up,” Neil reassures as he shakes Erik’s hand in welcome. Predictably as soon as Nicky sits down Kevin is all over him, investigating Nicky’s sweater with quiet curiosity. 

Aaron and Katelyn arrive not long after. They’ve met Kevin before, and he loves Aaron. Neil would like to think it’s a predisposed soft spot towards short blond men who don’t talk much, but he knows that Aaron is good with Kevin in his own right. He tries to not be annoyed by that, because he’s an adult.

No one outside this group would ever think the cousins could be any good with children, so Neil kind of cherishes their private truth. Watching Kevin squash himself between Aaron and Nicky on the couch and accidentally poke Aaron in the jaw with the corner of the book he wants them to read to him – together – is actually pretty great.

Kevin still doesn’t get Christmas, but he wakes when Nicky does at six AM, burbling quietly through the monitor. Neil is awake long enough to feel the mattress move as Andrew gets up for him and then is out again.

The next thing he knows, there’s an insistent patting at his face with a small, sticky hand. This is familiar enough by now that Neil doesn’t startle, muttering a greeting to Kevin without opening his eyes.

“Fuck that’s cute,” Nicky says from the doorway, which does get Neil the rest of the awake pretty quickly.

“Language,” Katelyn says as she passes down the hall, voice stern.

Nicky winces. “Whoops. Hey, we’re going to do presents and then Andrew’s going to make food, he says you need to get your ass up.”

“Uh huh,” Neil replies, hoisting Kevin onto the mattress before he falls trying to climb up himself. It’s a bad habit – he and Andrew both agreed it was better that Kevin didn’t try to get into bed with them in the middle of the night, for obvious reasons – but it’s kind of hard not to sometimes. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

“There’s coffee,” Nicky says, and then leaves them to it. 

Kevin is content to huddle into Neil’s side now he’s awake, sucking on his fingers again. Neil wraps him in blankets while he gets up and pulls on a t-shirt and sweatpants, and then hoists him onto his hip to take him out to the living room.

The number of presents has multiplied significantly since yesterday. They always get gifts for one another at the winter holidays, and it’s not even the first time they’ve done the whole ‘Christmas Morning’ thing, but usually that’s Andrew and Neil going along with the others, not them instigating it in their own home.

It’s weird, but nice. Neil sits on the couch by Andrew and takes the coffee offered to him, watching as Nicky introduces Kevin to the concept of unwrapping gifts.

It’s objectively pretty funny. Kevin is far more enamoured with the wrapping paper than he is with the gifts themselves, making a complete mess of the carpet as he basically rolls around in it. He opens all of them, meaning the adults have to do a confused handing over of gifts with no labels to their intended recipients once he discards them. Neil catches Katelyn taking pictures and fixes it in his mind to get them from her later.

Neil gets a small cactus from Katelyn and Aaron, and a large flat pot from Nicky and Erik, both of which are meant for his collection of pot plants and terrariums about the house. Andrew gives him a bunch of photos of Kevin from the last four months in defiance of their usual practice of not getting each other anything, which is fine because Neil got him a framed picture of Kevin crying on Santa’s lap from their ill-fated shopping trip and a new sweater. It’s a very dark green, and soft to the touch.

Eventually Kevin tires of wreaking havoc, bringing his two new toy cars to the couch and attempting to crawl up between them. Andrew hoists him up and wedges him in, taking the cars to examine them when Kevin passes them to him. He looks relaxed like this in a way most people wouldn’t assume possible, surrounded by his family and wearing a sweater that looks black but isn’t.

Katelyn takes a few more pictures. Neil is definitely going to need those, too.

[junker-town]

Couldn’t Be Me: Help, my brother is Steph Curry

This week’s advice column is about sibling rivalries, and how to cope with being the lesser child.

Welcome to Couldn’t Be Me, a weekly advice column where I solicit your personal dilemmas and help out as best as I can. Have something I can help you with? Find me @_Zeets.

Whether your sibling is better than you at basketball — and gradually eliminating your team from the playoffs — or beats you in a video game, being bested by a sibling is tough for a lot of us. Siblings are the first people we compete against, and our rivalries with them run deeper and hotter than any others. That feeling of being second best can be hard to deal with, but it’s important to remember that beyond that rivalry can be an appreciation, a chance to celebrate someone close to you for being great at something.

This does not include a younger brother having a bigger penis, however. Don’t ask. You’ll see farther down.

Seth:

My brother and I have played basketball together since we were young. We both were pretty great at it back then, but as we got older, he quickly surpassed me in skill. The higher we rose, the greater the distance between the two of us. Now we’re playing against each other at the professional level, and it’s not even a fair competition. He’s more accomplished, more known and beloved, and so much better than me that one SB Nation writer once called me the store-brand version of him. Even though our parents try to support the two of us, I know deep in their hearts that they love him more. How could they not? I come off the bench and he’s probably going to win another championship. I know I should be happy for him, but I can’t help but feel envious and a bit small in comparison to him.

CBM:

It’s unfortunate, but history is full of siblings like you. The ones who are overshadowed. The lesser talented ones. You can find solidarity with the likes of Luke Hemsworth, Brett Harrelson, Neil Connery, Mychel Thompson, John Millsap, Zoran Dragic, and Taylor Griffin. Talent can be genetic, but sometimes it’s not divided evenly. You happened to wade into the talent when it was almost dry.

The problem is that you can’t be too bitter about this. Unless you want to go Cain vs. Abel, which I don’t think is the right route here. I think the best way to think when you’re the less talented sibling is the same way that every human in this culture of ours desperately needs to start thinking: that even though you two grew up playing against each other, and there’s forever a connection between the two of you, you’re not in direct competition with him. Your story is yours, and your duty is to improve yourself as much as you can. Celebrate your brother; his success should bring you as much happiness as your own.

Your goal is to do the most with what you have been given. Envy will always inhibits that.

Luis:

I was playing u14 [American youth soccer] and my little brother was playing for a gold club. One day we went to get new cleats. My brother grabbed the predators, I grabbed the f50s.

My dad made me put them back. He said to me, “when you play like your brother, I’ll buy you cleats like your brother.”

Martin:

This is about the first time my little brother beat me at FIFA.

Long story short, I am seven years older than my little brother. I obviously always beat him from the time he started picking up a controller to about the time I went to college.

I started playing less and he kept on playing a lot more, so by the time I’m 19-20 he’s super good. We play at this party with some other friends of mine, he beats me 1-0, and he was (obviously and understandably) over the moon.

I was mad, livid, he beat me in front of my friends, I swear I considered walking away or I don’t know, beating the crap outta him. But eventually I came around and saw things for what they were, my little brother had grown and it was very natural for him to be good at video games.

To this day he’s a fucking master. He plays Ultimate difficulty like it’s a walk in the park and I struggle with World Class.

CBM:

These two submissions are stories of younger siblings surpassing older siblings, and embarrassing them in the process. I have no consolation for Luis, since I was that younger brother who was better at the sport, and I can see myself in his dad. I can’t be wasting good money on nice cleats for someone who can’t honor them. It’s a cold world. You better bundle up.

For Martin, I sympathize. I believe deeply in embarrassing your younger sibling in video games. I believe that making them cry is a great way to build character. It’s a rite of passage to adulthood for them to know that the world, starting with their older sibling, can be merciless. That there are people out there who can be much better at something you love, and that all you can do is try your best, fail, cry, and get better.

I also know that the dynamic eventually reverses flow. That by showing the younger sibling no mercy, that you only set them on the path to destroy you eventually. I remember when my little brother and I played in a FIFA tournament that he won, beating me badly in the finals. I was livid. Perplexed. Flabbergasted. Something had to be wrong, either with the controls or with the order of the universe. I couldn’t believe it. As I was still grappling with this new truth, my little brother turned to me and quoted a line from one of his favorite animes: “Every warrior must fall. Your time is now.”

It be like that sometimes.

Julian:

When I was 19 and my brother was 17, I returned home unexpectedly from college to find him having sex in my room. It was bad enough to learn he got off on defiling my bed with a random scallywag, but even worse was before he noticed my presence I saw him pounding away, and he was putting in work.

To add psychological injury to insult, when he leaped up from surprise at my intrusion, I discovered he was packing a jumbo Mr. Plumpy below deck. My own fry was not supersized, so this was devastating. We have the same parents for God’s sake!

Up until then I’d held such an upper hand in the sibling dynamic. I was a successful athlete, and much better looking in the traditional sense. I was popular and dated a slew of beautiful girls throughout high school. But going forward it was clear to me that women wanted me on their arms while they wanted my brother in their beds.

I have a beautiful wife and three children now; my brother is still a bachelor at 35, and has dated a diverse array of women over the years, all of whom regard him with a fierce loyalty, like he is some sort of deity. I have always inspired adoration from women via kindness and decency. It kills me not to know what it’s like to inspire dedication and need simply through bestial prowess and lust. I’ve never talked to him about this, but this shit put a huge dent in my confidence. What the fuck am I supposed to do?

CBM:

Hey man, that’s some wild shit. Hold on, give me a minute to get over you calling your brother’s penis, “Mr. Plumpy.”

.

.

.

All right, then.

Penis envy is a terrible disease that has plagued the conscience of many men for no good reason. Men are usually more obsessed with the size of their penises than women are, and you shouldn’t have your confidence affected just because your brother may be an exceptional case. You’re not alone, however. Size has been socialized into a determinant of masculinity for eons.

But the biggest issue here is your idea that women are conquerable through sex. I understand that when you’re a young guy, that’s how sex is marketed towards you, and it’s easy to absorb that way of thinking. But as an adult you have to work to grow out of it. You are unabashedly reducing women to objects who you hope will follow and worship you because of your dick.

Women aren’t easily manipulated machines. You ought to know this; at least, I would hope you don’t view your wife this way. And yet, you hold onto this view regarding your brother’s relationships, then suggest that the size of his penis is all that matters. That is fiction created by a false perception of what sex, masculinity, and being a woman actually mean.

But yes, try not to think about your brother’s penis so much. Use that time productively and read The Second Sex or something.

[jeffreyzma79911-blog]

Kid's Miracle Recuperation From Rare Cancer After Mum Gave Him Cannabis.

A 4 year old from the U.K. is actually being called a wonder boy" after surviving a drowning that left him marine for almost 10 minutes. Genevieve is an excellent selection for parents which really want a 'generation' sounding name, yet are wheelsed from the worn-out Jen names. Just what I particularly ased if concerning Maternity Magic is actually just how quick and easy to read and simple to observe this is 250 web pages of high quality material supported by a face to face examination with Lisa Olsen herself. The magic" required for the canonization involves the scenario from little bit of Lucas Baptista, whose tale has to date been shrouded in secrecy. Alia And The Account From The Rose is a book that presents kids to the hijab. 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As an example, our team read that the buns, which the kid gave Jesus, were barley buns. The observing metaphysical child titles are actually the excellent method to celebrate your ideas. Now, don't acquire me wrong or even misunderstand ... the techniques inside Lisa Olson's Maternity Magic do concentrate upon troubles that a girl (and a male!) can possess that would bring about problems in getting expecting normally. He has released 3 compilations of brief myth, Magic Boy and Various other Stories, City Smokes, and The Wrecking Garden as well as an unfamiliar Pet dogs of God, the final three of which were named Notable Manuals by The big apple Times, plus all which have been actually released in England, Germany, as well as France. In the overdue eighties I would certainly learn that a young boy brilliant in California discovered how to make hydrogen coming from water successfully along with a twelve volt electric battery and regular car power device, during the course of the 1970s. Based on the web, a magic can be an event that may seems strange by the techniques linked with mother earth consequently exists to become supernatural through source and even an action gotten in touch with God.

[houstonlocalus-blog]

Album Reviews: Royal Trux, SZA + more

Royal Trux — Platinum Tips + Ice Cream

The live album is a weird thing because essentially it creates something aural that is enjoyed mainly as a visual experience. The band on stage, the energy, the crowd, the unpredictable is packaged as a listening experience. Whatever the idea of the live album, a kind of rock staple, Royal Trux’s Platinum Tips and Ice Cream is a document of one of the world’s greatest rock n’ roll bands. There is no real way to experience Royal Trux as the band they were, but that is not really the point here; the point is to experience Royal Trux. First up, I would suggest, as a convert to the Trux-ian religion, that this album be for the unanointed a crash course. It’s only 12 songs, and for a band as excellent as Royal Trux, there is so much more to explore. However, the 12 songs presented span almost the entire Royal Trux universe, from “Esso Dame,” “Ice Cream,” “Red Tiger,” “Mercury,” which are all early bangers, to later masterworks like “Blue is The Frequency,” “The Banana Question,” and “Deafer Than Blind.” The magnificence of this album is that, as anyone who knows the Trux can attest, there are no perfect versions of a Royal Trux songs, they have always been subject to interpretation by the band in whatever form they see fit at the time. “Junkie Nurse” is more boogie than the album version, but “Mercury” is a very true version in accordance with the original. The charisma and magic of Jennifer Herema cannot be captured on any record, but this does have traces of that magical dust. Neil Hagerty is a monster guitar player and that is on full display here, as Hagerty almost faithfully recreates every great Royal Trux lick and then some. At one time, the live record was the introduction, but it was also farce, add in more crowd sounds, overdub some instruments, but this is not that trickery because the Trux don’t play that shit. They do respect the craft, and the live album goes with the narrative, so here it is, you are welcome.

  SZA — Ctrl

We all hope to exercise some level of control over our lives, to feel that we are navigating more than just participating. In your 20s, this is the thing, always trying to exert or display control and most times that involves our romantic lives, our parents, and our friends. SZA has made the perfect album for someone in that place, and there’s actually a song called “20 Something.” I feel like this album is a companion to Rihanna’s Anti in theme, it takes the living of life within the loves, betrayals and confusions of “figuring it out.” “Love Galore” is the sidechick situation, much like “The Weekend,” the shared love including the guilt and the lack thereof; I love you but not this. “Doves In The Wind” begins, “real niggas do not deserve pussy,” later to clarify “you deserve the whole box of chocolates,” the idea of being more than the object of and subjected to. “Drew Barrymore” is the clear hit of the album, however “Garden (Say It Like That)” could also fill that spot, a song of the joy of the delusion: “you’ll never love me, but I believe it when you say it like that.” The album bangs, the beats are ridiculous, but unlike other SZA albums, the singing is front and center, the lyrics discernible. It’s probably her best album in that sense. Get with it.

  Andrew Cohen & Light Coma — Unreality

Andrew Cohen is/was a member of two of my favorite bands, Silkworm and Bottomless Pitt, and also, in my humble opinion, one of the best guitarists walking. However, that is not the (only) reason I was ready for this release; it’s also because Cohen has a knack for writing a song that is both humorous and thought provoking. Unreality is where we are, living our lives within the insanity that is living a life, the comic tragedy. “Your Biography” has the lyric “we were learning all the way what was important, what to give away,” a true tale. Have you ever cleaned your garage and decided to donate the popcorn maker that was once the center of your recreational existence? It happens. Musically, this is great guitar music. There is no rapping or fusion, I appreciate that, if you have been a fan you will continue to be. “Repack” is of the Silkworm style, a superior style. “Sugar Puffs” is for those of us who have children or problems with vices: “I’ve been living on sugar puffs, 43 years have been enough, they have melted into some stuff.” But maybe the puffs are ideas and there comes a time for change, a diet of the mind? “Midwest DTs” is gold, “Blue Dragon” is gold. Music is best when you feel things and think about things, and both happened whilst listening to these gems. So no, son, you cannot have a fidget spinner, go outside and find a dead body or a troll living in a cave like the good ol’ days.

  House and Land — House and Land

The old world was fucked up. The Appalachians were a wild place in the early stages of ‘Merica with it’s unemployment and satanic possessions, but dammit, the music it spawned! House and Land are singing the songs of the old world today, but they feel modern because we are still affected by many of the same things, even the satanic possession. “False True Lover” is the “love song” as I love thee, thine has married thot (well maybe not thot), but here the beauty is magnified by the sparse instrumentation of 12-string guitar and banjo; it is mysterious and moving. God, in a particular space, represents a deliverance from evil, and everything is evil, so the true salvation is death. So death becomes a good thing, or deliverance does, and “The Day Is Past and Gone,” “Home Over Yonder” and “Feather Dove” all deliver the idea of transcendence, and they all sound transcendent. Comprised of Sally Anne Morgan and Sarah Louise Henson (The Black Twig Pickers), the instruments here — 12-string guitar, banjo, shruti box, upright bass — are all naturally amplified. These are the sounds of folk and Appalachian ballads that evoke images of trees and mountains and natural law, but it is not an antiquarian affair. “Unquiet Grave” is like a free jazz version of folk. These songs are from a time, but they also represent the darkness that is. “Listen to the Roll” is about walking through a graveyard, the drone technique applied summons the ghosts, but ghosts of what? This is an excellent record, a haunting record, it is a space and a place, an environment. Also, if you have not heard Sally Anne Morgan’s solo albums, do that now.

  Half Waif — form/a

“I’m so aware of all my moods, all my moods when I’m around you; What if I remove myself from all the action knowing that every mood is a reaction.” This is the way excellence starts, that magnificence is courtesy of the song “Severed Logic” from the brilliant release form/a. It’s the acknowledgement of presence and prescience, I am here because I choose; but if I choose you, I choose this, it is a psychological thriller. The suppression of the self is sometimes what it all becomes, “the highest I will ever climb is hardly high enough,” sung in ”Wave,” the idea that these limitations are imposed (externally and internally). form/ a explores the self as that which involves and evolves, but that one can never truly change something until there is a realization of the thing. Pop music does not always have to acquiesce to the idea of “dumbed down.” All of these songs could be about love or a person, or an obsession or an idea, which ultimately love is. “Night Heat” encapsulates the confusion of that situation perfectly: “I try to get away, but I don’t know what I’m after.” I need to leave this to go where? But all of these limitations: relationships, bodies, conditions, are all forms that can be reformed or abandoned: “and you have been patient through all of my storms, forgive me baby, but what’s one more.” This a superior work, it is incessantly beautiful and provoking, it is all and everything, I am engulfed and enraptured.

  Big Thief — Capacity

Capacity, according to Dictionary.com, is the ability to receive or contain, and this can be taken many ways. In some ways, we understand people within their capacity, what one can you endure or sacrifice. Big Thief is never above the heavy, but here it is delivered with a gentleness and grace. “Shark Smile” is the fatal story of a car accident, but your feet tap as you cringe. Adrianne Lenker, the chief songwriter in Big Thief, is a beautiful singer and wordsmith, turning the awful into the digestible. “Watering” has the lyric, “He cut off my oxygen and my eyes were watering as he tore into my skin like a lion,” which is presented in a calm and subdued tone that speaks of a peace with the abuse. A helplessness or acceptance, and either is disturbing, but the song also jams hard so you are crying and while your head nods. The band also shines here, Buck Meek’s guitar lines pierce at the right time, the rhythm section of Max Oleartchik and James Krivchenia are McVie/Fleetwood tight. The band’s last album, Masterpiece, was good, but this is stellar, and I loved the last album. This is the sound of a unit. “Haley” is ridiculously good, and “Mythological Beauty” is awe inspiring.  While these songs have subject matter, the album is ultimately about humanity, someone loves the monsters, too. We are all capable of terribleness, we can inflict and be inflicted, but we find ways, even in nightmares and breakdowns, we go on, scarred but alive. Excuse me while I pull this knife out of my side.

  Kevin Morby — City Music

The soundtrack of our lives. The best music narrates our stories, helps to color our canvas. It is at the times the caption to the photo, it gives context and connection. Kevin Morby’s City Music is that, as you live your life in the city, these are the tales of the city folk living, loving, and lying around. “Come To Me Now” is the worried love, looking out the window into the night, staring at the phone, pacing the floor. “Dry Your Eyes” is the Solomun Burke slow jam, it is sad and grooving, it is walking alone at night, driving the old haunts, the unspeaking company of lovers; it is soul music because it stirs that. City Music is just that. The city music, the tunes that accompany the backdrop and the drama, the downtown band in the bar, the guitarist on the street, the Mariachi band, the oldies playing in the restaurant, the cars and their jams. It is the vibrant sound of the city and being alive. If one were to listen to this album several times, the favorites would adjust themselves to the setting and the mood and it’s all here. “In my time of sorrow, you have a song I could borrow” goes the beginning of “Pearly Gates.” “Downtown Lights” ushers you into the night or the morning, it is the last stop on the trip, the journey through. This is a whole experience to be felt as such. Oh, that city music.

Album Reviews: Royal Trux, SZA + more this is a repost