[Sarah]

I think we need to start considering WHEN the songs were written and done a little more.

SGCYM and DoR were written .. most likely.. wayyy before Show You How and It Was You, which share some characteristics to my ear. I am Waiting and TTFTS were recorded way before too. Shut Us Down.. no idea when that was actually written, but I'd guess it was around the Elizabethtown time since it's a co-write. So.. that leaves us with Not Too Late, Under the Skin, CAD, and Juniper.. which all have a very similar feeling, imo.

Truth be told, as much as I love SGCYM and DoR, I find myself skipping over them now because they don't fit the "feeling flow" and sound of the album. GoS didn't happen and I'm sad about that.. because had his SYW tracks been combined with some of the GoS demos, that would have been one hell of an album, but it didn't happen, and now, to my ear, SGCYM and DoR are a bit out of place. For the first.. oh.. 15 album listens, I was glad they're there. Now, 20+ listens later, they just don't match up at all for me.

Analyzing this album all as "one piece" and one idea does not make a lick of sense because we know it's been in the works forever and ever. And I think it's REALLY, REALLY unfair to say that SGCYM and DoR are the "gems" because it sounds most like what we've already heard! We're just USED to them because we've had them on the village recorder and GoS demos forever.

I still love them, but just like the SYW stuff, quite frankly, I'm over it in the "new" feeling way. And if the new acoustic bits are what Lindsey wants to represent where he's going now, fine by me, he's got my attention. We're always holding up the banner of "ohh our Lindsey is so inventive and new" then when he actually DOES something pretty different for himself we want to call the recycled stuff we've already heard the only gem. That makes the temperature of my fan blood start to rise a bit. Maybe not boil, but rise, definitely.

And back on topic of It Was You, it almost sounds Mirage to me. I love the harmonies that are buried in the chorus. Are the Law and Order songs trite? Excuse the man for making a shorty. I find it to be a shining moment of happiness on a cd otherwise filled with tones of sadness, despair, and search for hope. This is a reflection of his life, and it's the only window he REALLY gives us to look at it. Trite is just offensive, regardless of who likes the song or doesn't.