Casey Stratton

Written in 2001 but never recorded until 2016 when I thought things in the US were getting bad. UGH it was so much worse since.

The Last Days of May

Something isn’t right
There’s a haze in this light
I feel warning signs
I can sense a demise

When the thunder came
In the last days of May
I began to see
An unraveling

I know you, I know what you do to me
This sadness creeping through my veins
I know you, I live in fear of you
This sorrow, remembering those days

There’s a heavy force
A deep sense of remorse
What could I have done?
Should have circled the sun
But what’s done is done
When you lose someone
You can tell yourself lies
But you can’t change “goodbye”

I know you, I know what you do to me
This sadness creeping through my veins
I know you, I live in fear of you
This sorrow, remembering those days

We’re still on a collision course
Anger fades into grief, into MORE
Make me see what I don’t want to face
There’s no way to recapture those days
Watch the clouds as they roll in tonight
A gathering storm in the fading twilight
Nothing ahead will be easy to do
But we must do what we can to get through

I know you, I know what you do to me
This sadness dripping through my veins
I know you, I live in fear of you
This sorrow, remembering those days

I know what you do
I know what you do to me

The Last Days of May, by Casey Stratton from the album The Collective Sigh

It's now been some days since I have been living with the new Tori Amos album, In Times of Dragons. The songs, a few in particular, are in my head all day every day at any given moment. That is information.

TL;DR: I really like it and I went in thinking I wouldn't.

When I first heard about this project, I thought "I'm not sure." I hit play the first time thinking I might not connect with it, but also thinking that was totally ok and not a reflection of her art but my space I am inhabiting in this moment. For me, I would not imagine a concept album about luxury and lizards and the woman who got swept up in it as the way I would want to process these times.

But this is the thing I have known since 1994 when I saw the tracklisting to Under the Pink without hearing a note of it. I thought. "What the f**k? Cloud on My Tongue? Space Dog? She has really lost it now." And then it always worked. Boys for Pele, Choirgirl and on and on. And after reading Piece by Piece, her memoir, I realized that much of what I didn't get about her work was because I wasn't smart enough to get it.

Anyway, this record came in a time of stress for me but also huge personal and literal transformation of my life, in response to the Trump America. AND...let's just address it because now she has: her voice is very very different now. So is mine because of my cervical nerve damage after my spinal fusion. It was hard for me to hear her voice so different because I felt I was mourning both of ours at once.

But something interesting happened. The songs hit me in a way where I totally got what she was doing AND I read her say she had to adapt or collapse. And suddenly, it all made sense to me and her vocal changes were not something to be sorry about but something to bring these songs what they needed in that moment, from their creator. None of us can be young forever in how we present our talents to the world.

So, to me, she nailed it. And the musicianship across the board is amazing.

Last thing: Songs like F***y Faudrey make me smile now instead of wonder why they stick out like a sore thumb. They are there for a moment of levity and silliness and we sure as f**k need some of that right now.