Juniper Tar in the general vicinity of Detroit

ATTN: DETROIT

A band I like is playing in your (sort of) town.

It’s a special joy for me when the distance between my heart’s two cities –- Milwaukee and Detroit –- is triumphed, for whatever reason, however briefly, like planets crossing paths. I even felt perversely comforted this year when Milwaukee Alderman Michael McGee Jr. was on trial this year –- and ran for reelection from behind bars –- around the same time embattled Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s shit started to hit the fan. I felt tied into a grand legacy of corruption, big city bullying and tragicomic falls from power.

This weekend presents another chance to bridge the chasm, one that YOU, dear reader, might experience even more keenly than I can, as Juniper Tar, a Milwaukee band that’s recently overwhelmed my affection, comes not just to Detroit but, in a strange and elegant coincidence, to Livonia, to a dinner theater less than a mile down the street from the hospital where I was born, across the street from a trashy mall I hung out at in high school.

I know what you’re thinking: why would I go to Livonia to see a show? That sounds like something I did when I was sixteen. But I urge you to think twice, especially if you like any of the following people, places or things:

Old Crow bourbon
Cabins up north
Pine trees
Three-part harmony
Soulfulness, generally
Slow dancing
Medium-fast dancing
Sailors
Lumberjacks
Wintertime
Autumn time
Plaid shirts
Trucker hats
Long, winding drives at night
Charming, handsome men

If you would like to know more, I highly recommend this interview on Milwaukee’s new-ish music blog Fan-Belt. You can also download an mp3 from their beautiful debut album, To The Trees, released in February. The full album is available on eMusic.

If you DO venture to Livonia to check them out (or perhaps if you’re a fan of American Mars), please let me know how it goes and what you think. I’m homesick!