Hamilton might be about the Founding Father, but Lin-Manuel Miranda pays proper attention to the women in his life, particularly his wife Elizabeth Schuyler, and her sister Angelica.
The Schuyler Sisters (along with little-seen Peggy) are introduced in a rousing number set in the streets of New York, but they meet Hamilton a little bit later, through a couple of songs that play with time and space in interesting ways.
Most of Hamilton is composed in the hip-hop/R&B style, paired with the sound of traditional Broadway musical theater, but on a few tracks, Lin-Miranda Manuel goes full-on British invasion. Appropriately, those songs are performed by the head of a different sort of British invasion, King George III.
Played memorably (until a couple of weeks ago) by Jonathan Groff, George is foppish and sarcastic and a little bit sadistic. He wants to colonies under his thumb, to quote another British rock band, and he’ll remind them of it ever so melodically.
Last year, my niece succumbed to Hamilton fever, a debilitating infection that my family soon learned is highly contagious. Over the summer she played two of the early tracks for us and we were intrigued enough to immediately order the album on Amazon.
Flash forward six months, and in one of the few truly spontaneous actions of my life, we have spent a ridiculous amount of money to fly to New York for the weekend and watch the Broadway phenomenon (and recent Pulitzer prize winner) live. I can’t freaking wait.
I generally don’t have much patience for Sufjan Stevens, one of the indie-ist of indie artists. But today’s Random SOTD, the first track from his 2010 album The Age of Adz, is lovely.
Here’s an example of Random Weekends at their best. This track from Barenaked Ladies Are Men, the band’s final album before the departure of Steven Page, is a lovely find — one I’ve probably heard before but I sure can’t remember when.
Released in 2007 as a companion piece to the previous year’s Barenaked Ladies Are Me, this album received generally strong reviews. But for some reason, though I’m a big fan of most of the band’s catalog, I just never took to it. And when Page left a couple of years later, so did I.
Meet Me In Montauk 