Time has a way of knowing what we have is strong

Today's song is by Vetiver and the song is called Been So Long. This is once again a song choice made by it randomizing on and being perfect for the part of the day during which it was playing. (This song came on as I was leaving Devil's Lake to drive back to Madison and I listened to it many many times while driving the highway home through the hills.)

I first heard of Vetiver several years ago, a little before the release of 2006's To Find Me Gone. One thing interesting about Vetiver in that they don't claim anywhere as home because they've moved around so much, they just say they're from America because they're all from different places in the US. They set their tour around each of them getting to return "home" as often as feasible while still hitting the markets they have for their songs. The singer-songwriter currently lives in California, just outside of San Fransisco.

Luckily for me, Madison is a good market and they come here a couple of times a year. I haven't seen them live since March when they last played in Madison, but they're VERY good, and well worth hearing.

Like a surprisingly large number of their eventual fans, I discovered the band while looking up some information on the grass vetiver as an herb in medical uses/aromatherapy/perfumes since I found it listed on some of my Aveda hair care products. It's actually a really interesting grass with a wide variety of uses beyond the medicinal -- but I won't bore people interested in music trivia by obsessing about cool naturopathic things. (Have I mentioned lately I'm a dork?)

The band does a lot of aural layering in their songs to build complementary harmonies which create a setting for the lyrics. In this particular song, the drum kicks in reminiscent of the actual heartbeat referred to in the lyrics; if you listen to it closely, you can hear both the systolic and diastolic heartbeat in the song.

I love the ending of the song, the way the layers end one by one into the faintly haunting memory of the melody. I also like the way the beginning is built, like a symphony tuning. I have a fondness for the quiet moments in music, especially the beginning and the ending. I'm not the person who will be shouting into the silence or the solo to be noticed -- I like to listen until the echo of the last note fades before clapping and cheering. I guess I'm of the opinion that if the musician/composer/songwriter wanted it to end early, they would have just done so -- and if you have any respect for the song or the musicians, yo should hear it to the end of the expression. Vetiver is a band to see with a respectful audience, one that doesn't have the obnoxious Freebird man, or you'll miss out on a large part of the songs because you won't be able to hear the intricacy and delicacy of the harmonies across the instruments being used.

They have a sound that is always evolving depending on the places from which the band members find their inspiration. The newest album has a lot more of a soul or funk twist to it than the work they were doing in 2006 but it's still a good album, despite sounding like it's a different band!



"I can't believe that you're knocking,
knocking on my door
Oh, it's been so long, been so long

I can't believe that you're knocking,
knocking on my door
Oh, it's been so long, been so long
Fate has a way of showing
on where you belong
Oh, it's been so long, been so long

Sound of my heart's stopping
A surprising stop
It's been so long, been so long
Time has a way of knowing
what we have is strong
Oh, it's been so long, been so long"