Back in January I tried doing some online dating. Someone told me about OKCupid, one of the free but less trashy online dating sites. I was sitting in Barnes and Noble with my laptop working on answering the seventeen billion questions they ask you to try to match you up with people and rate your compatibility, when some guy instant messaged me.
him - "Hello, how are you?"
me - "Pretty good, how about yourself?"
him - "Good."
(a few more lines of other boring chat-with-a-stranger niceties, then...)
him - "I see from your profile that you like Sigur Ros. Did you hear that they are coming to Austin in April?"
me - .........................
(Yeah at that point I was gone, away from OKWhateverCupid, buying my tickets and texting Brooke to inform her that a page in our young adult lives was about to turn).
I don't think it would make any sense for me to try to describe this band. You really just have to hear their music to understand. There are few people for whom I play a sample who don't. I usually hate those people.
I was first introduced to Sigur Ros by none other than A. Weibert during one of many late-night trips back to TM's campus during what came to be called The Magic Hour. These were the wee hours of the night when TM graduate interns could roam free from our interns / homework / responsibilities and goof off at The Dairy Palace, home of the world famous hamburgers and ice cream, and the only restaurant we knew where you could actually order freedom fries and freedom toast right off the menu. The drive home was about 30 minutes long and there was only one rule for all passengers of the car: you must listen to Sigur Ros the entire time without falling asleep. At about 3:00-3:30 in the morning. If you failed this test of endurance, Andrew would roll down the windows and scream at the top of his lungs at you.
One of my favorite Sigur Ros memories is from me and Brooke's Costa Rica adventure during Christmas vacation in 2008. We didn't make many plans and consequently had a good deal of time on our hands. So we literally sat on the beach for hours, just staring. God. Watching the ocean waves breaking under the heavy clouds while listening to "Untitled 8" on repeat over and over was positively hypnotic, cleansing the mind and soul.
It was Sigur Ros that got me through college - sitting at some desk for hours, battling exhaustion and ADD, chained to the computer writing a paper, reading some very boring text, or trying to Photoshop someone's wedding by a soon-approaching deadline. Without SR I certainly could not have gotten my degree.
(Because God loves me, they played one of my notorious homework songs):
The concert, interestingly enough, took place in an arena in the middle of no where. As close as we were to the Live Music Capitol of the World (that's a pretty big claim), they played in good ol' Leander. What was really peculiar was the weather - it's been a horribly hot winter here in Central Texas, with maybe one combined week of cold days, and a tiny bit of rain. But the morning of the concert and for a good 2-2.5 days it was Ridiculously cold! Almost.....
Icelandic.
Needless to say the music and visuals were as spectacular as I could have expected and even more so. I thought it would feel more intense, fast-paced or emotionally pulsating. Actually it was quite the opposite, as if time had slowed down. I don't know if I can say much else to describe the experience in retrospect. Instead I'll just quote a few things I jotted down in my journal while it was happening...
Music that takes you to the best places you've ever been in your life, and some of the worst...but only long enough to remind you that you aren't there anymore...now you are safe.
I remember how foggy I used to feel...
Follow your heart
Let it live
Never close it down again...
This is a holy moment...I'm not saying that to be silly. I really expected total euphoria, but this is something different...so relaxing...like a prayer.
Few experiences turn off the chatter in my head like this one.
him - "Hello, how are you?"
me - "Pretty good, how about yourself?"
him - "Good."
(a few more lines of other boring chat-with-a-stranger niceties, then...)
him - "I see from your profile that you like Sigur Ros. Did you hear that they are coming to Austin in April?"
me - .........................
(Yeah at that point I was gone, away from OKWhateverCupid, buying my tickets and texting Brooke to inform her that a page in our young adult lives was about to turn).
I don't think it would make any sense for me to try to describe this band. You really just have to hear their music to understand. There are few people for whom I play a sample who don't. I usually hate those people.
I was first introduced to Sigur Ros by none other than A. Weibert during one of many late-night trips back to TM's campus during what came to be called The Magic Hour. These were the wee hours of the night when TM graduate interns could roam free from our interns / homework / responsibilities and goof off at The Dairy Palace, home of the world famous hamburgers and ice cream, and the only restaurant we knew where you could actually order freedom fries and freedom toast right off the menu. The drive home was about 30 minutes long and there was only one rule for all passengers of the car: you must listen to Sigur Ros the entire time without falling asleep. At about 3:00-3:30 in the morning. If you failed this test of endurance, Andrew would roll down the windows and scream at the top of his lungs at you.
One of my favorite Sigur Ros memories is from me and Brooke's Costa Rica adventure during Christmas vacation in 2008. We didn't make many plans and consequently had a good deal of time on our hands. So we literally sat on the beach for hours, just staring. God. Watching the ocean waves breaking under the heavy clouds while listening to "Untitled 8" on repeat over and over was positively hypnotic, cleansing the mind and soul.
It was Sigur Ros that got me through college - sitting at some desk for hours, battling exhaustion and ADD, chained to the computer writing a paper, reading some very boring text, or trying to Photoshop someone's wedding by a soon-approaching deadline. Without SR I certainly could not have gotten my degree.
(Because God loves me, they played one of my notorious homework songs):
The concert, interestingly enough, took place in an arena in the middle of no where. As close as we were to the Live Music Capitol of the World (that's a pretty big claim), they played in good ol' Leander. What was really peculiar was the weather - it's been a horribly hot winter here in Central Texas, with maybe one combined week of cold days, and a tiny bit of rain. But the morning of the concert and for a good 2-2.5 days it was Ridiculously cold! Almost.....
Icelandic.
Needless to say the music and visuals were as spectacular as I could have expected and even more so. I thought it would feel more intense, fast-paced or emotionally pulsating. Actually it was quite the opposite, as if time had slowed down. I don't know if I can say much else to describe the experience in retrospect. Instead I'll just quote a few things I jotted down in my journal while it was happening...
Music that takes you to the best places you've ever been in your life, and some of the worst...but only long enough to remind you that you aren't there anymore...now you are safe.
I remember how foggy I used to feel...
Follow your heart
Let it live
Never close it down again...
This is a holy moment...I'm not saying that to be silly. I really expected total euphoria, but this is something different...so relaxing...like a prayer.
Few experiences turn off the chatter in my head like this one.
3 comments:
I love how music takes us through life. The journey is so much better with a soundtrack.
Those journal notes describe the experience pretty well!
Aside: My mom lives in the country outside of Indianapolis. We went to brunch at this place in a suburb of Indianapolis (still kind of country) and they had "freedom toast" instead of french toast. This was last Christmas . . . over ten years after 9/11. I just cracked up. I'd heard of the renaming silliness in DC, but had never been somewhere that had renamed it.
That is hilarious! Yeah I wish I had a photo of the Dairy palace menu to show you.
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