I've got a lot of old friends that're getting back in touch
And it's a pretty good feeling yea it feels pretty good
I get a lot of double takes when I'm coming round the corners
And its mostly pretty nice its mostly pretty alright
'Cause most kids give me credit for being down with it
When it was back in the day back when things were way different
When the youth of today and the early seven seconds
Taught me some of lifes most valuable lessons
There's gonna come a time when the scene will seem less sunny
It'll probably get druggy and the kids will seem to skinny
There's gonna come a time when shes gonna have to go
With whoevers gonna get her the highest
There's gonna come a time when the true scene leaders
Forget where they differ and get big picture
'cause the kids at their shows, they'll have kids of their own
The sing-a-long songs will be our scriptures
We gotta stay positive
We gotta stay positive
We gotta stay positive
We gotta stay positive
Alright, here we go for age 25 song.
This one is all about the live music experience. The biggest differences as I moved into my mid twenties was that for one thing, I was more into music than I had ever been in my life and for another, all of a sudden I had a lot of disposable income.
So this is the age that I started really going to a lot of concerts. Mostly in Toronto, it's only an hour or so up the highway, if traffic is good.
In my early concert days, the top band was Arkells, who I've now referenced twice but not drafted. Simply, they played in my hometown often and they got bigger and bigger and bigger and I've seen them so many times and being part of that rise was amazing.
But for live concert, small bar, Toronto experience, you can't compete with The Hold Steady.
I saw them twice on the Stay Positive tour, once at The Phoenix and the second time at
Lee's Palace in Toronto. It is a legendary, low ceiling, graffiti themed, incredible acoustic, small capacity venue that is going on 35+ years. It's probably still my favourite concert ever.
If you're a Hold Steady fan, you've probably noticed they play favourites. On years they don't do a big tour, they do these sets of shows at 4 or 5 cities, where they do 3-4 nights a row in the same city... and they come to Toronto every single time.
There is a love affair between Toronto and The Hold Steady and there is a greater love affair between The Hold Steady and their fans. As they say, "there is so much joy in what they do" and really not many other live shows come close to matching the outright jubilation, brotherhood and not stop sing alongs.
The referential stuff, the "smarts" in the lyrics, I love everything about this band. My first love album from these guys is Boys and Girls in America and then I went backwards to Separation Sunday and Almost Killed Me. By the time this album came out and I finally saw them live, every song from every album was scratched into my soul.
The album this comes from is my avatar and has been for quite some time. If I had to define my world view in two words, it would probably be "Stay Positive"... and yes, the fact that I'm taking this in the song category and not the album category means I'm taking that other 2008 album that means so much to a bunch of us next round... so apologies in advance to Marco and a couple others.
Anyway, with no further delays
Age 25 song - The Hold Steady - Stay Positive