"On a desert Christmas morning 1981
One month shy of six years old
In the valley of the sun..."
A year prior to this a musician I knew growing up, the lead singer of the band Pedro the Lion, started a multi-album project where he talked about the childhood towns he grew up in. One album for each place he lived in. Much of my writing that I did about my growing up years started in 2021 when he was working on the second album in the series entitled "Havasu." Upon its release in 2022 I was surprised that some of his stories were somewhat similar to some of my recollections.
I took this as an opportunity to compare and contrast those song lyrics with my thoughts. The album from the first set of towns he grew up in was titled “Phoenix” and I may incorporate those stories into my own personal writings as well. Since that record influenced me on more of a subconscious level I didn't think about making direct comparisons until now. I find it exciting that his project is an ongoing process that can work in parallel to this one!
This set of albums are the primary influence on this project. As they keep rolling out this page will continue getting updated. He also releases single songs from time to time which will likely end up on the three remaining records.
This is the latest album from the series. I found out about that when I went to a show where he debuted one new song from it. He also spent some time talking about it which really makes me curious how this album will link up with its follow up called Paradise. Both albums talk about Paradise but cover very different life events as I understand it. The lyrics from the new song talk about new music he discovered at the time and the significance of checking out what is going on in Seattle.
It is interesting to note that the cover art is now slowly revealing a face. This is something which you can so faintly notice on the Havasu cover but the elements are a bit too spaced apart to really notice what it was.
Bazan Solo Interim Releases
In 2021 Bazan put out a set of solo singles with a couple of original songs that I bet will eventually make their way on future town records. Some of these songs deal with events from later years in his life like marriage.
Strange Negotiations Film
Strange Negotiations chronicles David's life from early years up until his current thoughts on faith in America.
The movie on his life was released in early 2019 around the start of the town albums. One fun fact about this movie is that it contains a clip from our home video collection! You can video the clip on my 1990s home video page as well as the trailer and of course it is in the movie itself.
