Dear Evan,

Your songs are amazing. I’m not sure if I’m up to the task of writing about them. I’ve had them in their own sacred playlist on repeat for four or five days now. Like you sing it —“you’ll need some time to get over.” Yeah, well, me too. But I’ve got this little red pencil and a little red note book, and I’m going to give it my best shot.

The songs are deep, personal, like love letters: I had a girlfriend once who wrote me so many letters I had to keep them in a shoebox. After we broke up, like years after, I was cleaning out my closet, and I found the box. I couldn’t resist sorting through it, even though I knew it would make me cry. I opened the folded sheets of paper like clams; each held a little memory potently bottled up. I began to laugh and cry, laughing through tears, and in a feverish state I stayed up most the night reading and rereading the clams, with a feeling, mostly, and especially around 4am, of overwhelming joy. There were anecdotes lived and jokes referenced, and I got them all, took them all as little tributes to me; to all the considerate moments paid—to every one—it felt there was a letter addressed as reply…every one but one, and that was the last one, extended with full knowledgethat it would never be repaid—so that it didn’t make me melancholy, and there wasn’t a moment of regret all night. So you’ll get the metaphor if I say your songs are like little clams.

I hella dig the references—the homages to, and parodies of, other styles which you’ve managed to fit within an overarching vision. Everything has that Evan Bailey feel. Each song, especially [8], is like a good translation—of Vanderslice: “I didn’t move to Colorado” or Nada Surf or, yes, I’ll draw the easy parallels, Weezer or Pixies. These are just reference points, really, almost meaningless to me, at least, when I’m just listening and not trying to do the impossible work of putting a sonic medium in print. But caricature is a worthwhile form; I’ve nothing against it; it’s just like any food you like but don’t want to eat every meal of the day—as Richman says: “Eat pizza for lunch; so that’s over. Someone says, ‘ok we’re gonna have take two and eat another pizza again’? No. You already ate lunch.” So, I should say instead that what I really enjoy are the subtle reference points, difficult to express; that’s what gives these songs their character, a kind of carefulness or thoughtfulness.

Well, I had to leave off writing to catch the train. I’m at Grand Central now, and the slow build in “When you die, everyone’s gotta say nice things about you” is pulling the stones out of the walls and bringing the firmament to me: cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/an-unusual-view-of-the-stars-and-stripes/. It’s a vaulted ceiling a multiverse away—oh, and that reminds me of this job I used to have, hell of a job, tired all the time, felt like the walking dead. I’d get home late every night to an empty apt., and I’d turn the tv on to bring a sense of occupancy to my irregularly shaped living room, you know, like someone actually lived there. Every night I’d wait for the sound to fill the room, but it never did. It more than anything washed over the room leaving it as it was with now an added layer of noise; that is, somehow the sound ran at right angles to the space of the room, not filling it in but stretching out in a new, unoccupied dimension. So, I hope you don’t think it strange if I say that your music fills my living room.

Later, John

p.s. Weezer whoos—I expect all of your songs to have them now. They really take things up a notch. “Get closer; get closer; get closer.” THIS is what the fourth and fifth walls are about: closeness. It is everything in this business to be able to strike the right critical distance. The bio is all about maximizing this distance, packing the product for sale. I can do that in a line or two: Power Rangers, No Shirts, Eye Makeup.