be afraid. be very afraid.

I spent the evening in the pleasant company of four lovely ladies at the Black Cat.  We were there to see Rhett Miller, who played a solo acoustic show and was obviously in part working out some kinks in the older material in preparation for an Old 97's tour later this year.  About five or six songs into his set, he announced that the new record would be out in May and mentioned that the next two songs would be the opening tracks from that record.  I was slightly underwhelmed when he launched into the first.  He had made it through the first verse and chorus and then abruptly exclaimed "Fuck!  I've been playing this in the wrong key!"  Without missing a beat, he changed keys and started again from the top.  The song sounded immeasurably better.  At that point, Emma turned to me and said something that sent chills down my spine.  "You know," she confessed, "when he changed keys it didn't sound any different to me."  I was shocked - shocked and awed.  "Yeah," she continued, "if he hadn't mentioned it, I wouldn't have known.  It just sounded like he started playing a little louder."

This is the first year in many that there is no clear Karaoke to the Death front-runner.  It seems possible, if not likely, that we will be crowning another two (or more) time winner in just under a month.  The circumstances have never been better than they are this year for a repeat champion.  I really didn't need to know that Emma's tin ear can't even register a simple key change.