the pearly gates had some eloquent grafitti

title: the trapeze swinger – artist: iron & wine

photo from writtenonthecity.com

It’s been awhile since I’ve done one of these. Let’s see how it goes. Oooh.

Paste’s cover for October features Sam Beam, of the massive, bushy beard and Iron & Wine fame. The arrival of this issue has been some trippy fun. The night before it showed up, there was discussion of Paste samplers. A couple of days prior, I’d been contemplating Our Endless Numbered Days and debating listening to the In the Reigns EP (with Calexico – love them!) since it’d been awhile since I had heard either. Within a day or two of the issue’s arrival, I watched In Good Company with my mom (for the second time. [the first had to have been before July of ’06, I’m thinking.] and then I caught it on television a couple of nights ago. I’ve decided it is definitely one of my favorite movies), and the soundtrack features several songs by Iron & Wine. This led to me obsessively listening to the song The Trapeze Swinger for a few days (and knitting, but that may be another story). And, upon listening to the sampler, I found out the Iron & Wine track (Boy with a Coin) became another one of those songs I obsessively listened to and got me to finally stop long enough to read the feature article/interview with Sam Beam. And between the track from the new album, and the discussion of said album in the article, I decided, come the 25th, the new album would be mine. Or at least sometime this week, if it came down to it.

I headed out this afternoon/evening to see if I could find it nearby, thus forgoing a trip to Big Flats. It was not here. But since I could check Best Buy’s inventory online, I knew it was in Big Flats. I’m kind of glad it was, actually. Well, besides the fact that it meant I could acquire it. 🙂

I left about thirty minutes after sunset. There was still light in the sky, though it was definitely fading. The moon was nearly full, and since the evenings are quite autumnal, even though the days are packed with the roiling heat of Indian Summer, the sky was gorgeously clear and had the slightest tinge of yellow about it.

The drive was a pleasant twenty-ish minutes. The moon seemed to be leading the way the whole time. And I futilely spent most of the drive in the company of a previous sampler, trying to give a fair shot to the songs I’d passed over when I got wrapped up in a couple of the others. Though I knew it would continue to put me a few months off of the discovery of cool music I’m already in the possession of, I finally gave up and popped in a mix of songs from several years ago that always makes me happy. And that moment was a fitting one to have caught a hint of the oil I’d applied after my shower, a scent that has a similar trigger.

After a brief stop at Panera to pick up some iced tea (I’m totally caffeinated right now, though [mostly] containing it quite well), I headed into Best Buy and almost immediately found the CD I was there for. Then I browsed and picked up a couple of other things and contemplated a couple more before taking my purchases to the counter to be… purchased. I then made my way outside, into a still-warm night. Soon, I was locked and buckled in, grateful the packaging chosen meant I only had to tear through some shrinkwrap before I could get to that shiny disc and load it in the player.

The drive home found the moon hanging back a little, though lighting up the sky to the degree of silhouetting the hills. There were lovely sounds pouring out of the speakers and filling in the space around me. The road construction and meandering traffic patterns took on an easy grace and as each track progressed into the next, I was pleased to find my anticipation for this moment was completely justified. I love it when that happens.