Last night I went clubbing for the first time in years, if not decades. My cousin Sam from back east was passing through Iowa on the way to a week-long series of gigs in Colorado with his band, Thunder Body. “Roots reggae and experimental dub” is how they describe it. Very definitely 21st century music. My cousin is a really fine player. He’s pretty seamless with this band, for having other musical territory of his own, and for being new to the line-up. I like the blues feel he brings to the genre.
My brother gave me the heads-up, so it was a fairly busy Saturday night–why not pile a road trip to Des Moines on top of a long day? (Church musicians and liturgists are not made for twenty-hour days topped by very loud music in a club until nearly 1:30AM.) My Iowa sister-in-law came too. We had a nice chat about music and family on the ride home. Whenever I hear good music, I’m less moved to dance and more to play. Actually, that’s even true of classical concerts. The instinct to play runs deep. Must be a family thing, my sis said. It would be way cool to jam with many of my musical cousins. (Like this one.) Can’t think of any other sort of family reunion I’d rather go to.
Ah well. It’s great to be living in the 21st century and enjoying all kinds of music.
