#hello emerson

The words are simple and workman-like but full of precise detail and intricate internal rhythms. “Sale Today,” for instance, reminisces about father-son outing to estate sales with rueful fondness. It’s bittersweet, though, because even this well-loved activity has mortality tucked into it. Croons Bodary, “You taught me to see the treasures passed down from retirement crowds to frugal types like you and me…you pay a bit under the asking but you make sure to stay in your lane/cause you could be next and I could be making the change.”  And should you think that the tune is all about the words, it’s not. “Sale Today Canon” distills it down to melody, in fluttering clarinet and swirls of strings, and it is just as moving when wordless.

“Couches” has some of the disc’s most impressive wordplay, the lyrics arranged in percussive patterns that pop in time with the music. The chorus is especially, knottily good, as Bodary chants, “the absence adjacent me misplaces complacency while hope sings like a little bird I caged up for company.” Say it out loud, and you’ll find that the phrases have their own music in them.

One of the most affecting features of this very rich and rewarding album comes in the intervals where Bodary’s dad speaks for himself in simple, honest terms about what has happened to him. Bodary adds little touches of incidental music to these cuts which underline the sense and feeling of them, but he mostly lets them speak for themselves. And what is very beautiful about them is that, despite nearly dying, Bodary’s father has no regrets. “I couldn’t see how I could keep living and not keep doing the things that I would do, right? And one of those things would be to stop and help people move a limb off the road.”

The story ends more or less happily. The elder Mr. Bodary makes a nearly 100% recovery (he still can’t smell, which is noted in the lyrics), and the family pulls together in a way that makes it stronger than ever. But as Bodary notes, it’s a temporary respite, a rehearsal, as he says, “for your hospice years.” And yet the very transitoriness of life is also the best argument for engaging in it wholeheartedly. Music, love, and family come together beautifully in To Keep Him Here and remind us to pay attention now and always.