That's good and all, but I have two questions for you:

1) How did you manage to listen to this just once?
2) Was your CD also very hard to get out of its case? I was afraid I might break it.

Regarding the order of the songs, I noticed that the lyrics are not written in the same order than the tracks on the CD.

Well I bought it yesterday, and my once was just now, when there was a bit of quiet in the house. I knew the album needed quiet and I was right. It'll probably be the only album I listen to solidly until the next classic comes out.



Not really, no. Hmmm...



Yeah, that's true. It didn't occur to me to check whether the sleeve lyrics followed the story in order. I'll do that next time.

The story (without song titles as I haven't memorised them yet):

A guy (a Christian) is married (I assume) with kids, living a perfect life, writing love songs to them, and celebrating life etc. But the marriage starts to unravel, during which time he starts visiting brothels (troublesome houses). Or, the marriage breaks down BECAUSE of his visiting brothels. (The song 'troublesome houses' mentions that after the breakdown, he still carries on visiting the brothels.) The reason he visits them seems to be a spiritual crisis, about his faith, about the truth, and about the fear of growing old and dying. There's a song where he's praying to God about whether he can really trust his woman, and whether God will still be with him when he's alone.

Three songs written about the post-breakdown situation: one is to the wife, celebrating how beautiful and full of life their kids are, and how the legacy of their love will live on in the children. Heartbreaking. Another is to his kids ('Kids'). In this one, he is an old man, thinking of his death, and hoping that he will still be here in 20 years to sing songs about them, and to love them.

And then there's a song about Jesus coming towards a crowd, carrying his cross, surrounded by dogs and flies (I think). The song is about how he is going to die for our sins. Obviously the album is about that sin, and possible redemption.

My take.

Interesting. I haven't put as much thought about it but clearly all these themes are here, even before I really paid attention to the lyrics I was able to pick them up.

I thought troublesome houses were bars, actually, but it works too.

Bars... yeah, probably. Or maybe even churches? Maybe this guy's found God in the Bible Belt or something, and his wife leaves him because she says he's becoming a crazy loon. The houses could stand for a lot of things.

Still thinking of picking this up, I've listened to it like 1.5 times but I really need to sit down and LISTEN to it, ya know?

I mentioned it in the RSD thread, but it's worth poking in here and saying that I bought "Superwolf" on vinyl on RSD and cannot freakin' wait to spin it.

Oh man once you do it will own your soul, after the last couple I had no faith that he had something like this left in him. So good. My initial favorites would now probably rank near the bottom, that's when you know you've found a special album.

Past two days, on discovering the reduced prices of albums on amazon mp3, I've bought:

Joya
The Letting Go
Ease Down the Road
Wonder Show

plus Soulsavers, with a cover of You Will Miss Me When I Burn.

Favorite songs so far: A King at Night, Then the Letting Go, and After I Made Love to You.

The most interesting part of this immersive BPB session: it made going to see Mastodon profoundly difficult, because my musical mood in no way reflected that music. It was solitary and very much a BPB mood.

Any idea where I can stream this? My laptop doesn't have a cd drive, the player is in the other room, and I don't want to download the damn thing.

Try to get inside my head, I can't seem to get these songs out of it.

I've been listening to these two almost nonstop lately. It's hard for me to describe the mood his music gets me to, but it's amazing.

About 5:50 on track 7 of the new one:

"The smell of your box on my mustache"

There's a few hilarious sexual references dotted about. Quite a beautiful and intimate line, in context. LOL

If I had to describe the mood, it would be like this:

wistful
vulnerable
lonely
full of dread
peaceful
vibrant
hopeful

And where is my queen
She’s as gone as can be
She’s a fine looking lady
And she liked to go down on me
And I liked to go down on her too

From "A King at Knight"

Recurring theme?

I just found out today he's playing at the Showbox in Seattle... a month after I move to the east coast.

Adult Swim/Kia brings you........... Bonnie 'Prince' Billy & Matt Sweeney covering Gene Watson’s “Love In The Hot Afternoon”

http://www.adultswim.com/promos/201005_kia/index.html

So has anyone seen him live? He's gonna be near me in December, but still a 3 hour drive. I'm wondering if it's worth it live. I love listening to him, just don't want to waste a drive.

I've seen him. The venue I was at was outdoors and I got there a little late because of work, which placed us in a shitty location. All things considered, it wasn't the best performance, but it wasn't entirely the band's fault. The material's tempo didn't match the crowd's. It was too bad; in the right place I'm sure he's great. Do you know anything about teh venue?

small, indoor club.

Saw him in a tiny hookah bar in 2004--he was touring behind "Greatest Palace Music," and Joanna Newsom was opening. "Milk Eyed Mender" had just come out, and she was still a relative unknown. I think the Bonnie Prince is a vastly superior artist to Newsom, but she completely outclassed him in every possible way. She was charismatic, charming, and put her tunes across with conviction--a harp is really an amazing-sounding instrument in a room no bigger than most people's living rooms. Oldham on the other hand I suspect may have been drunk; he slurred everything beyond recognition, and kept making these contorted, googly faces that suggested he might possibly vomit on the folks in the front row at any moment. I'm glad I saw him, and will buy his records forever, but I haven't made any effort to see him since.