Our middle son, the one who passed away, loved music. I mean he loved music. He had music playing day and night, and except for some more contemporary country music, he loved all kinds of music. He favorite playlist had Pavarotti singing opera, had the song about the best day ever from Sponge Bob, had a lot of Arlo Guthrie and Phish, some Eminem, classical, rap, reggae, you name it, it was on his list. But in his last few years of life, he met the members of this (then) little known band in Vermont, Twiddle, and he was in love. He made us crazy listening to them wherever we went, and went to as many of their shows as he could. I have to admit, I liked them okay, but it wasn’t love at first listen for me.
When he died, it was a long time before I could listen to any of his favorite music. Then, finally, as we came upon his first post-death birthday, I sent a message out to his friends asking them which Twiddle songs they thought were his favorites. The fascinating thing was how many different answers I got from the friends, but they all had clear explanations of why they were the favorites. A few days before his birthday, I sat down with the list, and you-tubed my way through the songs, reading the lyrics as I went. And suddenly I got his love affair with them. So, as we come up again on his birthday, I am listening to a lot of Twiddle, but now, I listen to Twiddle a lot everyday, and beyond his love of them, I just plain like their music. So, in that light, here are the links to two of my favorite of their songs, two I hope they will play this weekend when they are back in Burlington, VT on our son’s birthday weekend. The first was one of his favorites, the second, one that they have released since his death, but I am sure he would love it, especially the insistence on the need to “love relentlessly.”