clairo is your brandi carlile
i'm thankful that tonight is the release of charm, the new album by clairo, whose previous album, sling, is deborah and i's shared favorite album as a couple, a kind of totem or sacrament that we treat with the utmost respect and affection (i.e. listening to it together after having sex and/or on drugs and/or just being quiet together in the same room). i'm thankful for this description i wrote of it in an old newsletter as "just a perfect thing, an artistic whole that i can't imagine being surpassed as my album of the year. i'm thankful for how much it feels like it creates a physical space, like a site-specific installation of sound, kind of in the same way that astral weeks can be seen as a terroir record for a place that doesn't exist but feels like it could." i'm thankful to recognize one of my biggest fuckups of our marriage is a few years ago when i unthinkingly scheduled business travel a day too early which meant that i was on a plane to ireland when deborah was going to the portland sling tour date i was supposed to be together with her at. i'm thankful to know that while i can never get that back, we're going to one of the tour opener dates for this album in september (i'm thankful that t, for whom brandi carlile is a lifestyle, said, when she learned we were going to the tour opener, "clairo is your brandi carlile", which is absolutely true). i'm thankful that clairo wants a free palestine and played at a gaza/sudan benefit concert last week in london with artists including earl sweatshirt and king krule, which like is an extremely me holy trinity of artists. i'm thankful that the heat dome has lifted (see also deborah's wonderful new newsletter about ice) which means with adequate cold-boxing of the living room we'll be able to turn off the air conditioner long enough to properly listen to the album on speakers, since i would never do it the disrespect of competing with that ugly noise. i'm thankful for the opportunity to close my eyes and let the music wash over me.
Previously on this day:
- 2016 (korean mother at wendy's the other day who was paying for burgers for her daughters with pennies from a coin purse, conversation d and i had about the difference between cocoa pebbles and cocoa krispies w/r/t snapping, crackling, and popping, pitchfork reviews reviews)
- 2017 (i'm thankful for this project's dailiness and messiness have helped mostly cure me of this, since i know that if the thing i write today isn't good (by my standards or someone else's) and the thing i write tomorrow isn't good and even if the things i write for the next week or two weeks aren't good, i am just going to keep writing and i know that eventually i will write something i think is good again)
- 2018 (my favorite ask metafilter post, coca cola life hacks, i felt better yesterday than i did the day before)
- 2019 (glassdoor, my work friend s, who is so good-hearted and always fun to talk to and leaves me feeling full of energy, the jingle "thank heaven for seven eleven")
- 2022 (sunrise alarm clock, invisible things by mat johnson, that though i feel apprehensive about a change at work tomorrow, i don't feel afraid)
- 2023 (that i didn't work any (more) overtime last night to try to get my big project done before the sprint ended, tomato poached fish, the temperature was cool enough yesterday evening that we could jam again in the attic and actually capture that)