“The Town Where I’m Livin Now” – Grandaddy
Grandaddy is a venerable band with a dedicated following and a knack for creating quirky, spacey, melodic indie rock; at the center of the sound is the sweet, sometimes high-pitched tenor of front man Jason Lytle. They’ve been around, with at least one notable hiatus, since 1992; their catalog is worth exploring, and isn’t as extensive as you might assume, given the on-and-off longevity–there have only been six original studio albums to date. Live albums and compilation albums are another matter. Case in point: Sumday: Excess Baggage, a B-side and rarities collection spun off the 2003 album Sumday and released digitally in August. “The Town Where I’m Livin Now” is a song that’s been around for years, but without an official studio release until it landed on this 2023 album.
The song is a swaying, bittersweet ode to, let’s face it, a surreal hellhole of a town. I assume that’s part of the joke and/or statement: we all of us here on planet Earth live among all sorts of unpleasantness and disaster, and–if we’re lucky–life goes on. Lytle, as he does, can sound a bit like Neil Young’s mischievous younger brother; the voice is high and winsome and seems to come with a baked-in wink or maybe just a shrug. And if this hits the ear at first like a simple, waltz-time acoustic strummer, keep listening. To begin with, there’s a burbling sound living at the bottom of the mix that doesn’t go away, you just kind of get used to it. Cascading piano arpeggios are buttressed by some looney-bin electronics. And the liturgical way Lytle presents these wacko lyrics is a central part of the not-actually-very-funny joke.
You can check out the whole album on Bandcamp. MP3 via KEXP.
Fingertips 