I’m headed home soon (for a month)!

Starting December 7th we have a 4-week layoff from tour before heading to New Zealand/Australia, Europe, the UK, more US dates, etc, etc, forever and ever amen. I’m really excited to family hard while I’m home, and grateful not to have to worry about juggling a million freelance hustles over the holidays for once.

Longview

In the Year of Our Lord 1982 I was born, at home, in Longview, Texas. I don’t have memories of that place, and by the time I was 2 years old, my family had moved back to New York State, where I’ve lived ever since. I didn’t even set foot back in the state of Texas until age 37, and being back there so many years later felt strange and almost as if I had entered a mythical realm—one that had loomed large in my imagination my whole life and never felt truly real.

Over the past several years I’ve worked in Dallas, Austin, Houston, San Antonio, and Fort Worth and every time I’m on Texas soil, my mind goes to the small city of Longview and I check my maps app to see how far I am from my place of origin (never very close: Longview is 130 miles east of Dallas, not exactly a major hub for tours or the kind of work I generally do, and I’ve never had the time off work to make the trek there). I don’t even particularly like Texas all that much if I’m being honest, but something in my blood draws me toward the place as if it might hold some secret to my character, my internal tensions—might resolve something in me that itches deep under my dermal layer.

After playing two shows in Dallas last week, I boarded the bus that would carry us overnight to Atlanta and had the realization that we were headed east, at least roughly in the direction of Longview. Once again I opened up Google Maps and ascertained that what seemed to be the most direct highway route to our destination (Interstate 20) would take us directly past Longview after a couple hours of driving. My mouth dried out and a lump began to form in my throat. So I stayed up and took the following four photos of my birthplace in the middle of the night, from a speeding sleeper bus:

These photos are as appropriate a representation of my relationship to Longview as I can imagine. Vivid yet unresolved. Abstract and dreamlike. Fantastical and unrealized.

The place of one’s birth is supposed to hold astrological significance, is a kind of first home, a jumping-off point. The first breath I took was Texas air. The first ground I felt anchoring my feet, the first cool raindrops I felt on my face, the first bird calls and babbling brooks and regional dialects I ever heard, the first floral fragrances that reached for my nose and rough tree bark that my hands reached for and felt—were all in this place. Some schools of psychoanalysis hold that a subconscious desire to return to the womb follows us our entire lives, and maybe returning to the place of our birth is a kind of spiritual regressus ad uterum, a figurative portal to that last place of safety, warmth, and security.

I’ll likely make a proper visit someday. It might not be a stretch to call it a pilgrimage, after all the mythologizing and aggrandizing I’ve done to the place. I’ll probably spend a couple days silently walking the streets, imagining my parents in their early 20s—my dad as a student and my mom diving headlong into full-time, all-consuming motherhood—both giving all they had to me and soon to my sisters as well. Wide-eyed and full of hope and heart. Stepping forward at the very cusp of lives that would hold joys untold, challenges unmounted, sadnesses unknown, love unimagined.

I have a cousin who still lives there. Maybe I should call him.

Let’s Get Retro!

Since ruthlessly murdering my personal social media accounts almost a year ago (!) and starting this newsletter, I’ve begun to miss the practice of simply sharing photos with my friends. I did not and do not miss the constant barrage of opinions and political insanity and the out-of-control and insulting curation of my feed by money-making algorithms. I do not miss the predatory brainrot of the infinite scroll or the lack of intention with which I interacted with those apps.

But remember when Instagram was new? Like 2010/’11 when all you could do was post square photos of your latte and your cat and a somehow suddenly transcendently beautiful fire hydrant? And it all felt very lovely and pure and you actually felt kind of connected with your friends? That was nice.

My friend Beau recently invited me to try out an app that his friend created/worked on called Retro, which I’ve been using for a few weeks now and is giving me that innocent early IG feeling. Who knows if it will stay that way as the app develops and grows, but for the moment, I’m really appreciating it. If you’re curious about it, CLICK HERE for a personal invitation from me! Just a heads up—there are some in-app purchase options but no ads or anything aggressive.

Here’s a little look at my Retro feed from last week, to give you a sense of the aesthetic and possibly draw you in…:

Tiny Desk

Remember when you discovered NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts? The first one I ever watched was tUnE-yArDs in 2012, and I probably watched it 6 times in a row. And the rabbit-hole opened up from there. I’ve discovered a lot of wonderful musicians, seen a uniquely intimate side of many I already loved, and have done the Leo DiCaprio GIF point countless times spotting my friends on Tiny Desk. To suggest that the beloved platform has been one of this century’s most important uplifters of hard-working, indie musicians is not a stretch. And yes, the dream of booking Tiny Desk has become less tangible for most musicians over the years and the annual Tiny Desk contest has begun to feel a bit bloated and at times more like a race for production quality. But the charm holds fast, and for those of us who have watched for a long time, the nostalgia is strong and the hazy dream still feels very real. I recommend watching the very first one (Laura Gibson) to see how far the series has come from its genesis in 2008.

On September 26, the David Byrne crew drove overnight from Buffalo, NY to Washington, DC. I hopped off the bus and walked straight to NPR’s Studios to receive all our gear and coordinate with Robin Hilton before the band arrived. I felt honored to be trusted to be the first person on the ground to get this train going, and within a couple hours the blue suits were on, the mics were placed, and David Byrne and his 12 bandmates took the tiny stage. The performance was electric and the day felt about as special to me as it gets (you can even see me for a few seconds helping with instrument changeover at about 3m57s. So there.).

Give it a watch if you like: