Song of the Day: Blitzen Trapper "Girl in a Coat"

A love letter to music

When I close my eyes and look back on the images of the music in my childhood, it is a slideshow of the covers of my fathers old vinyls. It is Sgt Pepper and his Lonely (but colorful) Hearts Club Band, Bob Dylan and his white boy hippie fro, Joe Cocker wailing, The Rolling Stones rocking. In middle school I would go through a serious classic rock phase, missing out on the pop trends of the time, including the whole Spice Girls revolution (I didn't miss much). Instead I listened to Simon & Garfunkel, Jefferson Airplane, and fell so deeply and madly in love with the Fab Four that three of my friends and I even took on the identities of each of them. I remember sitting in my father's car on a summer day with the top down and the wind blowing and saying, "You had the best music. I wish I had grown up when you did."

I would eventually shed my Beatles persona (I'll leave you to guess who I was) and while these bands that took up such a large part of my heart have never left my playlist rotation, I would soon discover that I live in a world that is as rich with incredible music as my fathers world was. I can't imagine my life now without Dave Matthews or each of the hundreds of concerts I have gone to that have changed my life in so many ways. For months I have been saturated in bands that will be descending upon Austin is less than a month to showcase their gifts. I have been pouring through bandcamps and facebook pages, carefully tracking each musician, taking notes, building playlists.

We are living in an an incredible time for music. Institutions like The Grammys may celebrate domestic violence and auto tune and it is easy to think we are descending into a scary music time of dubstep and amateurs who want to be famous and think, "Thank God there's an app for that!" But turn the dial past the top 40 and there is a world rich in talented musicians. Hell, even Top 40 is being slowly taken over by musicians like Adele and Foster The People!

We are living in a time when artists like Dawes, Blitzen Trapper, The Head and the Heart, and so many others are just beginning. The Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver, Foster the People and bands we don't even know that we will one day love, have many more melodies and poems to enrich our lives and I feel overwhelmingly lucky to be here for it.

I'm not sure my future daughter will ever spend a year answering only to Taylor Goldsmith, Mark Foster or Grace Potter, but who knows if one day we will be driving down the road and she will turn to me and say, " You had the best music. I wish I had grown up when you did."

Accidental Playlist: SXSW 2012 1st Edition

For the next few weeks leading up to SXSW I will be posting playlists featuring SXSW artists I am excited about. I decided to split them up instead of making one gigantic list. This week's list features great artists like Sharon Van Etten (who will be playing Stubbs as part of NPR's opening night showcase!), Alice Russell, Trampled By Turtles (my fave group from last year), Charlie Mars, Blitzen Trapper, The War on Drugs, Ingrid Michaelson, Wheeler Brothers and many more. Take a listen and get as excited as I am! Also, be sure to check out my color coded spreadsheet of SXSW 2012 artists.

Accidental SXSW 2012 1st Edition

Blitzen Trapper at Utopia Fest

Standing on the Utopia Fest stage, face buried behind his harmonica, Eric Earley of Blitzen Trapper reminded me of the old Bob Dylan vinyl covers that used to litter my father's den. His sound isn't all that different either. It was easy to listen and imagine that I had stepped back in time. Perhaps this is what Dylan always wished his voice had sounded like. Hailing from Portland, OR, Blitzen Trapper rocked the Utopia Fest stage with hints of folk, southern rock and all kinds of awesome.

Blitzen Trapper at Utopia Fest 2011

With cigarettes dangling from their lips, Earley was backed by well worked vocal harmonies and instrumentals. They have a great way of taking their album and ramping it up for a live, festival setting. The crowd loved them, I loved them, and my heart skipped a view beats every time that soulful harmonica wailed out.

Blitzen Trapper at Utopia Fest

Earley's lyrics are the heavy kind that stick to the bones. They are stories, meanings, lyrics that entwine themselves in you. Then again, when I talked with Erik Menteer after the show he said, "We all have a little redneck in us, just a little bit more, too." Perhaps that blend of old sounds reminiscent of the 60's, poetic lyrics, southern rock and a side of redneck is what makes their sound so successful. Whatever it is, Blitzen Trapper is sure to take it far. 

Photos from Utopia Fest: Blitzen Trapper