#breaking vows

Serengeti - “Breaking Vows”

I saw a man breaking his vows for the first time He looked like he was having fun, fun Finally got to use that one line It looked like he was having fun, fun

The Charleston, and pearls, woman silent on his arm, yep It was a disco, disco, disco Take it to the bridge then

Beautiful pearls, beautiful pearls Cross the Rhine Got to the east Bonn was a great time Dance, dance

"Breaking Vows" by Serengeti

MG:

Technologically and thematically, there is nothing about "Breaking Vows" that couldn't have been accomplished thirty years ago (or earlier!), in fact similar sounding songs have been released, but after hearing Serengeti deliver this weird poem over a mix of keys and strings (both synthetic) I'm sure that thirty years time still isn't enough to make this sound mainstream to most people. It might not even sound like much of a song to most people. There's little to it, the weight is carried by Serengeti's delivery - the way he sings the first "fun" and then drops into a short deadpan for the second, the way his voice fades into a whispered scatting, the intonation on "disco." If you let it, these moments can grip you as tightly as any hook.  What "Breaking Vows" and "Smith's Room" (and, really, "Institutionalized") share is the application of this delivery (not quite spoken word, sometimes almost sung, sometimes almost rapped) to bizarre or upsetting subject matter. Serengeti's tune about the apparent pleasure of adultery runs perpendicular to his flat vocals, betraying the heartbreak laced into the song. Whether you even bother listening to the lyrics, the sadness digs in, the same way you can tell someone is mad just from the sound of their voice. It's a jarring three and a half minutes but not without its pleasures, if you're willing to squint.

DV:

Serengeti // Breaking Vows

I woke up on my friend's living room sofa at 7am when a small whispery voice leaned into my face at a startlingly close distance and asked who I was, why I was still wearing shoes, and if I had seen his missing action figure.

The irony of sleeping uninterrupted until 11AM yesterday morning is not lost on me in this moment, but these children are adorable and funny and well-behaved and if I leave now, I can be back home in my own bed by 8AM and their parents will still be sleep-depraved and washing syrup out of someone's hair. I love these kids so much, but I also love leaving.

These are my very favorite Sundays. No time tables, no commitments, nothing to do but a whole lot of nothing. I made a pot of coffee and discovered a kickstarter for 18th Street Brewery out of Gary, Indiana <insert your quip involving murder, Michael Jackson or both here> and it feels like everything that is both making and breaking the craft beer industry right now.

Can the city of Gary (or more specifically, the mere IDEA of Gary) sustain a craft brewery when it can't even successfully convince people to pull off the toll road for gasoline? I'm not sure. But with the unwavering support they're receiving from an industry king like 3 Floyds, and local-Chicago innovators like Revolution and Pipeworks, I hope so. Selfishly, because it would make the drive from Chicago to South Bend more appealing, and objectively, because with so many new breweries opening each year, these guys are going to need as much help as they can get.

10 months on the job, I get at least one email a week from someone I used to know (co-workers, classmates, teammates, neighbors and internet strangers) asking for advice and/or feedback on how to break into this business. As a comparison, I worked in pro sports for nearly a decade and only fielded this question once or twice, so maybe that’s a sign of the times. My advice is simple. I tell them to be kind to everyone because you never know when you might run into an old classmate you haven't seen in years, who now holds a VP title at 26th largest brewery in the country, who sends you an email out of the blue asking if you're interested in joining his team of marketing misfits. Sometimes it happens like that. Most times it happens like that. 

So I donate to the kickstarter and now I'm 'invested' and I'll receive a t-shirt and some coasters, but more importantly, I'm funding someone's dream to reinvigorate a desolate and dying Midwestern city and Olmsted would be proud, as would my freshman year Urban Planning  professor for even remembering the name of the most famous intellectual leader of the American city planning movement in the 20th century.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's an exciting time to work in beer. Growth and change and innovation and opportunity are everywhere. '