SOD: Josh Ritter -- A Certain Light

This is a damn good breakup song. Although Josh Ritter is singing about his recent divorce, "A Certain Light" will speak to the sixteen-year-olds who have had their hearts broken for the first time as much as it does to those facing the end of their marriage. But there is an absence of bitterness here. Instead, there is a sense of looking forward without dismissing the past, the pain, and the love lost. Josh Ritter's latest record, 'The Beast in Its Tracks', comes out today, March 5.

Some of my favorite lyrics:

"My new lover sweet and kind / The kind of lover that one rarely finds / And I'm happy for the first time / In a long time"

"And she only looks like you / In a certain kind of light / When she holds her head just right"

"It's been winter for a while / The north winds will cut like a baby child's / It was hard to think her smile / Could bring the springtime"

Listen to the album in full at NPR First Listen, and listen to an entire Josh Ritter concert from March 4, 2013.

SOD: Husker Du -- These Important Years

"I think that lyrics don't mean anything unless you can apply them to your own situation, apply them to something you may have seen in yourself or seen in other people." --Bob Mould, lead singer/songwriter, Husker Du

Every day, I exchange pleasantries with coworkers but we rarely try to give each other something to hold onto, a real connection once in a while, rather than the "how's it going?" we bounce off each other. Sometimes it seems like we should be saying, "look, I'm not an asshole, but I don't have anything to say to you."

This is a perfect Monday song, but really it's an everyday song. All Monday long I want to fast forward or drift into a haze and float on by, getting a little closer to home time or to the next weekend.

My preferred plans and expectations are usually tied up in some moment in the future, a weekend trail run, or Christmas vacation visiting my family, and anything could happen to rip those expectations apart in a moment. Ferris Bueller and Bob Mould say, stop to smell the roses, or they might end up on you.

Chorus #2 (sort of):

Expectations only mean you really think you know
What's coming next, and you don't

SOD: Richard & Linda Thompson -- Shoot Out The Lights

The story goes like this, man and woman singers fall in love, get married, and record and release six albums over eight years together before divorcing. They are British singer/songwriters Richard and Linda Thompson, and their final record, Shoot Out the Lights, from 1982, is their most successful, but also their darkest.

The title cut opens side two of the LP, a very Springsteen move to put a song so heavy and powerful in that position. I read the song as a man hiding in his apartment after a breakup, metaphorical gun in hand, hurt, scared, and alone, unable to leave his place during the day, but trapped inside the echoes of his own mind at night. Don't miss the searing guitar solo at the end. It shakes me and I don't even like guitar solos.

I've put off listening to this album for years, despite that fact that it's heralded by all my favorite rock critics, including Bob Boilen from NPR, who I agree with on almost everything (except The Who; how can he like them so much?), but now I've gotten to a place where I want to hear a lot more of Richard Thompson.

Key Lyric:

Keep the blind down on the window

Keep the pain on the inside

Just watching the dark

Just watching the dark