I did not get a very good picture of Matt on stage that night, but I did take this one of his face on the big video board.

(Sunday Paper, Year VI, Issue 49)

I’ve mentioned that I’m in a bit of a reading slump.

I don’t know why.

I just haven’t been motivated lately to pick up and read the book I have siting on my nightstand.

So a year-end “What I’ve Read” post just isn’t going to make the cut this year.

But since we haven’t been doing the ol’ “What I’ve Been Enjoying” piece of the old Sunday Paper format, I thought why not tell you what I’ve been enjoying listening to and watching.

So I’ll do that the next couple of weeks, starting with music.

I feel obligated to tell you I had this planned long before Spotify released my preferences this week…turns out that timing works pretty well to supplement this post.

But first, I'd like to catch you up on something music-related that I don’t think I’ve properly addressed yet.

Back in October we saw Matt at the Leader Bank Pavilion in Boston, opening for (the?) Counting Crows.

You may remember this was the weekend of the Boston Marathon. (Was it a mistake to go to a concert and spend too much time on my legs the Saturday night before the Monday marathon? Maybe. But come on. This was a can’t-miss event. I promise next time I run a marathon to rest my legs the entire weekend.)

You may also remember that the show was supposed to take place in August, but was postponed. So, bottom line: it was very exciting that it happened. But I never wrote about it because I kept writing about the marathon.

So let me tell you: It was great. I always love seeing Matt play, but this time was cool because there were all these people there, really, to see a huge band that they love so much and you could just see the brains of people in the seats clicking to be like, “Oh, this guy’s good” about Matt.

I like watching that happen in a club when there is a much smaller amount of strangers that happens to. To see it with this many people was cool - part of me wishes I had stood in the back so I could have seen it happen with a hundred people at the same time.

The other thing worth pointing out is how joyful Matt seemed while playing. He really seemed to visibly enjoy this tour and these performances and playing with the Counting Crows guitarist on a couple of songs. It was nice to see.

Oh, and I got to check out backstage.

So I have nothing earth-shattering to share about what I’ve been listening to - you’re going to continue reading and think, “Yeah, that’s pretty much the John I know” as far as artists and songs. But allow me to tell you a quick thing or two about what I’ve been thinking about what I’ve been listening to.

First of all, I threw on the Elf Soundtrack while I was putting up some Christmas lights. Solid collection of music right there.

OK. On to what I intended to talk about:

You might remember that I am fairly new to Spotify. So I’m still exploring it and every so often I think, “Oh, right, I have access to that music now!”

That’s what happened with my favorite Huey Lewis and the News album. For a long time I only had one - and I only had it on cassette. And you’re probably thinking “Sports”, because you know me and how much I love sports and if there was a band I liked that had an album called Sports that was excellent that’s a pretty good guess that that would be the album I had. But it was “Fore!” (I didn’t get Sports until years later when I did the Columbia House weird albums in the mail thing.) And I played that tape over and over and over again. Mostly on my walkman but we also listened to it on a long car ride to visit a cousin at Notre Dame back in the early 90s. And I hadn’t heard ‘Fore!’ in years. But last week while raking I was like, “Oh I should listen to that.” So I did. And all of these memories came flooding back. And the album is still great.

I haven’t written about her in a while but I’m still a big Sara Bareilles fan. Whenever one of her songs pops up on a playlist I start trailing off thinking about how lucky I was to jump on the Sara Bareilles train when I did. A friend gave me one of her early albums and I’ve been kind of in a front row seat with her somewhat meteoric rise. I got to meet her with one of my daughters at a book promotion event in Boston back in 2015. She was the first performer we saw in concert as a family. And Kathy and I were able to see her in one of her starring turns in ‘Waitress.’ I will never forget hearing her sing “She Used To Be Mine” on that stage. That’s one of my all-time favorite personal live music memories.

(My top all-time favorite? It might have been my first time seeing Billy Joel live. I was in college - didn’t have much interest in concerts before then, and he hadn’t been touring in a bit. And I went with some college friends and we were almost late but I walked in and was just getting to my seat and he started pounding out ‘Angry Young Man’ and it might have brought tears to my eyes.)

It’s a little crazy how little I’ve listened to Billy Joel on Spotify….but really the past few months with the app has been about exploring new (to me) artists instead of older stuff I’ve enjoyed. I haven’t spent a whole lot of time with The Killers, either, even though they were my band of choice through most of the pandemic.

And even though next week I’ll give you a look at what I’ve been watching and enjoying I’ll bridge the weeks with this: Man have I been fascinated by Get Back, The Beatles’ documentary on Disney+. (See, it’s still music-related.) I'‘m watching in bits and pieces, so I’m not sure when I’ll be done but I love watching that process. I kind of can’t believe how it all comes together. Paul McCartney is kind of a genius to watch. (I mean, I guess they’re all musical geniuses, but Paul has a certain amazing musical ability that is incredible to see.) I like that I don’t really know the story of how this all ends up in a rooftop concert - adds a bit of drama to the whole thing. It’s also interesting, too, that because this album was so weirdly put together and out of order in the catalog it’s the one I listened to the least, so I don’t know these songs as well as I know other Beatles songs. I know Abbey Road much better, for example, and it’s cool to see a couple of those songs pop in along the way here. But I feel like I’m learning while watching just a really cool process come together. (Haha. Come Together. That was not intentional.) The last part I watched was when Billy Preston drops by. I knew he was involved, but I didn’t know how. That was wild to see to.

Notes

*I’m still hoping to do an end-of-year mailbag post - if you have something you think would be a good question for me to give a playful/serious answer to, put it in the comments below…or on the Facebook page…or e-mail me…or text me…or look for another Instagram post soliciting questions. I’ll be trying a couple more times before that post goes up.

*My Spotify stats are a little skewed (Spotify 2021 ‘Warped’, if you will) (Because they call it ‘Wrapped’. I wanted to explain that one because it’s funny but if you don’t understand Spotify like I didn’t for a long time you wouldn’t get it.). I abused the fact that I could listen to a song I liked over and over and over again. That’s why Vance Joy’s ‘Lay It On Me’ was my top song. And while Death Cab For Cutie as top artist makes sense, since I was catching up on their work, I don’t know that ‘You Are A Tourist’ was the song I’d have chosen to listen to the most in a full year. I do like it. But it wouldn’t be first choice. I was giving a lot of other songs a chance. As I’ve written about here before, ‘Ode To The Mets’ from the Mets documentary on ESPN became an obsession of mine - so that was a ‘Top Song’, and since I listened to The Strokes a bunch after that they were the only real surprise in my Top 5. The rest? Vance Joy, Keane, and Sara Bareilles. So that adds up.

*But as for the top 100 Songs Playlist? I’m not sure I even listened to 100 different songs in the time we’ve had Spotify.

*Sorry, Matt. I didn’t listen to you on Spotify a lot these past few months. But you popped up on the Top 100!

*One more note: I ran to my Peloton playlist a bunch during marathon training. A lot of songs from that playlist make their way into my daily mixes. It’s not a perfect algorithm. They try to force certain songs on you with no seeming algorhyme or algoreason.

*Speaking of all this social media, for the non-music social media you can find me here on Facebook, and here on Twitter. Give those pages a like or a follow.

*Had to re-do some of the lights outside this week. Even after I tested the bulbs before putting them out, some of the lights still fizzled out. Might be time to get some new outdoor decorations. (Also, I put the lights on the tree, and those have been the same lights for years. That I’m definitely going to have to fix for next year - I don’t like the way these guys were flickering when I was putting them on. Hope they have at least 20 days left in them.) But it looks great, I’m thrilled with it. When will I show you a picture? I don’t know. Some time in the next couple of weeks.

*Today’s gotta be Super Mega Crossword day. Right?

*A couple of other seasonal traditions that I haven’t updated you on yet: One is that I’ve had a few caramel brûlée lattes from Starbucks, my all-time favorite seasonal drink anywhere. But I’m trying not to go too crazy. My eating habits haven’t been as disciplined since, say, October 12. The second thing is I’ve been holding out on the heavier jacket - I’ve told you before I like to wait as long as possible before resorting to it because other than layering under it, that’s the warmest I’ll be getting for the winter. But I have a feeling I’ll be using it soon. I’ve been chilly.