Re: 'venge

Emily took me to see Colin Meloy at the 9:30 Club for my birthday last Sunday. Not that it was my birthday last Sunday, or this Sunday, or even next Sunday, but that's when he was playing and sometimes you do what you have to do.

So he was doing his third solo tour without the rest of The Decemberists. I've never seen the whole band live, but based on this show I'd see them in a second, though hopefully they'd play for longer than that.

'Twas a good show, and though he tended to play mainly Decemberists songs that I don't really care for (Am I the only one who hates "Perfect Crime #2"?) and he dropped "Everyday is Like Sunday" from the set (so now I've seen both Morrissey and Colin Meloy and neither played it live), the final song in the encore was one of my top five concert moments. Easily.

He played a solo acoustic, campfire sing-along version of "The Mariner's Revenge Song." It may be my favorite song. If you've never head it go here and listen to the live KEXP version. It's a murder ballad about a sailor whose mother has a relationship with a rake, who leaves her destitute. On her deathbed, she implores her son, our narrator who is about five at the time, to seek revenge:

Find him, bind him
Tie him to a pole and
Break his fingers
To splinters
Drag him to a hole
Until he wakes up
Naked
Clawing at the ceiling of his grave

Tilda loves the song and sings along. There is nothing creepier than hearing a two-year-old singing that. It's all very cute.

Anyway, it's a great song, and though I thought I loved it before, seeing it live was awesome, even with just one guy and a guitar. The audience sings the mother's words and during the instrumental waltz section the crowd sways back and forth like waves in the ocean.

And it's just occurred to me that there's no real way to convey the experience to someone who wasn't present, or to someone unfamiliar with the song. I would say get the song and listen to it loudly and often. And if you get the chance to see Colin Meloy live with or without The Decemberists, do it.

And on another nautical note, I think I may have found my favorite verse from the Bible. I'm not particularly religious and I'll keep my views on the whole matter of god to myself, thank you very much, but this is from Psalms 107: 23-24, and is beautiful:

They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters;
These see the works of the lord, and his wonders in the deep.

Now if I'd just known about the Hellboy comic they were giving away in New York yesterday that uses the first bit as it's title.