Swing That Blade, Molina

One of the subtle perks of cycling to work is that I always get to listen to music on my iPod, meaning I get about 45 - 50 minutes of Music Appreciation (as we used to call it, back in university) over the round trip. When I'm not biking, it can be hard to find the time to hear the odd album, especially since the chances of having the right music in whatever car we're taking that day always seems to be slim to nil.

So today my listening selection was Magnolia Electric Company's outstanding live CD called Trials and Errors. My music-guru friend Tim, who introduced Vicki and I to MEC a couple summers ago, agrees that this is one of the best live CDs on the planet. All I really know is that I love it to pieces, and if it were a comic, I'd've read the covers and the first couple pages off of that sucker by now!

The live performance of the song "Cross the Road, Molina" blows me away everytime I hear it. There's a refrain in it that goes:

"blue chicago moon swings like a blade above the midwest’s heart
swings like a blade (x2)
swing that blade above us(x2)
show us how close it can get
show us close you can get
show us how fast we can lose it
how bad we’re out numbered"

that's delivered with a driving instrumental beat that really makes it sound like something out of that scene in Apocalype Now when they're butchering the cow. In fact, today on the bike ride home, I was imagining the music video I'd produce for that song, if I was any good at all at either animation or live action cinematography. I could see a warrior king, maybe in a post-apocalyptic future, whose tribe is being threatened by some sort of invading hordes. He's the only hope they have of survival, and he's wielding a huge sword, ala Conan, as wave after wave of attacker descends on him. Since the blade is really the full moon in the song, I'd have it (the moon) streaking across the sky, echoing the arc of his swings as he fights all through the night, against overwhelming numbers.

I could totally see all of this playing out in my mind as I pumped those pedals in time to the music's rhythm in the fading daylight, and wouldn't you just know I looked up at the end of the song and noticed the moon was already out, and it was full!

The whole thing was very cool, but I'm sure my words have failed to describe it well enough to do anything but remind me what it was like. Ah well!

To learn more about MEC, and even order very affordable music, you could always go to their website. I wish they'd update it more often than they do, but it's still a nice place to visit!