New Release Tues: Mindy Smith

I was talking to my brother on the phone last night like we do often on Sunday nights. He usually calls about 10 o'clock so we can catch up while he does the weekly shopping at WalMart. I always know our call has about 10 minutes or so left (his drive home time) when he says, "Just a sec, I have to pay. (then quietly, away from the phone to the cashier)How much was that?" Or something like that.

Last night I had to laugh. After talking for about 30 min or so, we got onto the topic of our blogs. He reads mine and is quite complimentary about it (he's such a good little brother). But he paused and thought for a second, then posed question that I could tell was being very deliberately and carefully constructed to not communicate the wrong tone.

He said, "You know that music you post for New Release Tuesday? I was just wondering if you could talk to me about what attracts you to that music."

No problem. I've heard that question before. Most times though it phrased like "why do you listen to that garbage", or sometimes "could you please turn that off". So I'm cool with it.

He went on, "No, what I mean is, it's just that your writing shows a poetic reflective personality that doesn't seem to be represented by the music you listen to."

Truth is, I just listen to music that rocks me with out offending me. If it degrades women or promotes drug use or violence, stuff like that, I just don't have time for it. Not when there is so much other good music out there.

And I guess it's only fair that he gets to ask me that. I did kind of get smart with him one time when I went to help him drywall his new basement. I always work better with the tunes going so I asked if we could fire up a boom box. He said sure and told me where to pick out CDs.

After looking through about a hundred classical and jazz CDs I finally turned to him and asked, "Dude, don't you have any music that requires electricity to make?"

It was good jazz, though.

But I still make CDs for his kids so they won't go totally unexposed to the electric guitar.

But this week I picked something that I thought he might appreciate. Mindy Smith is so awesome. Very bare bones music, but man does it carry a punch. Check out her myspace page for more tunes. It's totally worth it.