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chords

I have been to a few concerts this week.
First was Muse (with Silversun Pickups) and they were artistically the most amazing band I have ever seen live.
But.
And get ready this is a big but that is about to make me sound 60.
It was too loud and there was way too much electric guitar crazyness and feedback for me. I kept checking my ears for blood and had the most giant headache in the morning.
I was just starting to think that maybe I was getting too old for the live music scene,
And then I went to the House of Blues last night and saw Jennifer Knapp.
If you don’t know who the heck Jennifer Knapp is maybe because she hasn’t written or recorded anything in about a decade. And it was all acoustic-y Christian girl music. But. She. Is. Awesome.
I played that Kansas cd to death back in the day and drove all the way to plainview ( yes, that is the crazy way they name towns in West Texas…Plainview, Brownfield etc) to see her a decade ago. Then I watched her at a little Baptist college in the middle of nowhere in a sold out auditorium with a few thousand people. Last night I watched her step on stage at the House of Blues in Dallas ( in the little room, not the big one…because well it has been a decade) with a Blue Moon in my hand surrounded by only a hundred or so people. And as she hit the first chord I was immediately taken back 10 years in the best kind of way.
I was in Lubbock on college couches or in cars driving around the loop with the radio turned up talking about life and boys and jesus.

And I settled into the couch and I remembered and soaked in her chords. And the new ones struck my heart in the same kind of way.

Before the show, I met some old college friends for dinner and ate 4 bowls of chips and laughed a lot and talked about Haiti and photography and ex-boyfriends and homeless people and where we were 10 years ago and where we thought we’d be now and recovery and old roommates and more ex-boyfriends and I showed them pictures of my cute kids and we caught up and asked for another bowl of chips.

And well, when I think about it, 10 years ago and tonight, my evenings weren’t so different. I hung out with friends we rode around and sat on couches. We laughed and listened to good music and we mostly talked about life and boys and jesus.

(check out her new stuff whether you knew the old stuff or not)

Comments

Beth (and Eric) said…
That was awesome. Oh, Michelle! I think I could write a list of 50 songs that are like this. "Strawberry Wine" is definitely one of them!

(And, a funny one -- when I hear the beginning little music to a Baby Einstein video, it reminds me of when we first moved to TX, and Paige was 10 months old, and we lived in an apartment in Addison.)
michelle said…
beth. i so thought of strawberry wine and driving down 4th street in your old jeep cherokee....when i wrote this post..

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