too late now, she's in my head

March 19, 2020

I went to Los Angeles back at the end of January, which now feels like a lifetime ago. While out there, I went to the annual Americanafest Tribute show, done before the Grammys each year to honor an iconic musician; this year’s was to honor Willie Nelson and featured a slate of artists, some new to me, some more than familiar, covering songs from across his discography.

One of the artists who really captured my attention at the show was The War and Treaty, the husband-wife duo of Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Blount-Trotter. Their sound blends together gospel, soul, country, and blues, and they had me from the very first note they sang.

If you, like me, have like 10 Bandcamp tabs open at any time as you preview new music, you should know that on Friday (tomorrow), Bandcamp is waiving their share of their revenue on all sales, which means even more money goes straight into the pockets of your favorite artists. So many musicians are struggling now, with concerts cancelled for the foreseeable future. The music industry being what it is these days, concerts are generally the major money-maker for bands. This is especially true as music consumption has shifted towards a streaming model, which pays an almost insultingly low return to artists. A lot of artists are wondering where next month’s rent is going to come from. I’m absolutely planning on spending a load of money on music I’d been procrastinating on buying. If you have the means, I encourage you to do the same.

Couldn’t figure out yesterday why I felt so computer-inept for the past few days, constantly hitting wrong key combinations on both my work and personal laptops. Well, turns out:

The Control and Function keys are swapped in position.

So no, being a shut-in hasn’t damaged my mind. Keyboards just apparently can’t standardize their layouts.

Wild.

What are you up to? What weird, petty grievances are starting to surface now that you’re (maybe) engaged in the work-from-home life? What surprises, challenges, other things are you facing? If you’re not able to work from home — or if your job has been impacted negatively by this — what can I — we — do to help/support you? Leave a comment or hit reply and send me a message.