It Was Everything To Me

This blog started 11 years ago, this week. I like to believe that I'm just as madly inspired as I was in my mid-20's, but the reality is that I'm three times busier than I was back then. Of course I'll still be writing about music that's made in Michigan; I'll still be interviewing artists based around the Metro Detroit area, and beyond. But this is the final post. It's so strange to write that out and have the period fall at the end. This is the final post....

Thank you to everyone who stopped by this site. Thank you to everyone who read these words. Thank you to every artist who sat down with me over some coffee to chat. Thank you to everyone who let me listen to an album a week before it came out, so that I could string together a small tidal wave of emotions and adjectives onto these digital pages.

I have only glimpsed what might have been only a modest impact that this blog had... But, being uncertain of its sustained necessity, I am using this post to put a period on it all. The 2,100 or so posts that stretch back over the decade are all blips that fall together to form a grander collage... Not only a capturing of contemporary Detroit music history, such as it was, but telling the story of a kid who grew into his 30's and held onto that mad inspiration, held on to the enthusiasm he found at live shows and the modest transcendence offered in deep album dives, with headphones...

As I said, it's not a sad day, or a sad post, because I'll be writing over at WDET.org, or ecurrent.com, or via Local Spins in Grand Rapids, or maybe somewhere else... But this blog did bring me some joy, so it's bittersweet to move on... I hope it brought you some joy, too. Don't let the music you listen to ever recede into the background. That was the whole point of this blog. It's listening, rather than hearing. And I don't know what else to say or write... But here are 40 songs that have meant a lot to me, as I've updated this blog throughout the years. Some songs are older, some are newer. And there are at least 40 more, 80 more, that just didn't happen to be on this streaming platform..., which I regret. But anyway.... Wherever you go next, listen closely... Start a dialogue with the music.