The Glow of Each Other's Majestic Presence

Today was a hard one and I'll have more to say about that later. Still, I'd been looking forward to this evening ever since I first started drawing at Joe's and checked out the calendar of upcoming events; I just had no idea how much I'd need it when it came.

Anyway.

First up was Suzanne Vega, playing a bunch of new songs from the--as yet unreleased--Beauty and Crime as well as pretty much all of those other ones you want to hear if you go to see Suzanne Vega. Strangely enough, it's the third time I've seen her this year--she played with the Brooklyn Symphony and she performed Luka at Joe's a few weeks back during a benefit.

AnnaCatherine once asked me what movie made me want to move to New York and I had to answer that movies had nothing to do with it. Music never really entered in to it either. To be honest, I never wanted to live in New York until I moved here and now I don't see how I can ever leave. Still, as Suzanne Vega played her new songs--many ruminations on the city in the years since 9-11--and I remembered all of the music of hers that I've listened to since Jim gave me her eponymous album back in Chicago all those years ago, I found myself thinking that the Vega viewpoint might just have been a siren call I didn't understand until I got here.

By the way, she's performing the club version of Tom's Diner nowadays, so you can all relax.

Next up was They Might Be Giants celebrating the release of their new album, The Else. Sure, I get it now; they're a terrific live band and they put on quite the show, funny and quirky and all those adjectives that pile up around them. Anyway, John Hodgman introduced them and he's pretty much an expert on all things, so you don't have to take my word for it . . .