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All right, one last night of decadence before my kids came home…

It was Saturday. You already read about the early Oyster Band part of my evening. I went on to finish the “Freedom and Rain” album. Just fabulous. I always love it. I love the pissed-off, flip, glad-I-figured-you-out “thank yous” in “Valentine’s Day.” She throws his clothes out on the landing so cheerfully it breaks your heart. So much to love in that album.

But I still couldn’t get “Night Comes In” out of my head. By that time, I had listened to June Tabor’s version a good many times, sort of fixated at first by that “lose my mind and dance forever” thought. Other lyrics drew me in more, though, calmer, more introspective thoughts. I decided that if I did not actually own Richard and Linda Thompson’s “Pour Down Like Silver,” I could at least attempt some plays of their song on Rhapsody. Sound not as good on my laptop, but lying on the dining room floor, it wasn’t half bad. Understatement. Slowed down, no longer mercury, now really silver.

All right, I get it. Tired, lying in the dark early in the morning. I get it. Wow.

It’s a little after 8:00 on a Saturday night, and I’m in my car, see the sign for the Pike. I pass through the normal money grabbers, and hop on, just so I can drive fast without stopping, at least for a few minutes.

June Tabor’s clear voice pours out, “Dancing ‘till my feet don’t touch the ground…” and indeed my feet touch nothing that I can perceive, and my heart leaps. I think water, want to dive into it, swim deeper deeper. I want passion. I want so much this Saturday night. But, in fact, it is already all here.

I have to wonder, this is so unlike Richard Thompson’s version of his own song, so much lighter, airy, in fact. Night does come in, as it inevitably does, but here it’s not silver; it’s mercury.

But now I’m not thinking, driving, faster than maybe I should, around Storrow, nonstop around the Charles, the lights, the night. If Thompson sings this with restraint, the Oyster Band lets it loose, flying.

I know the Thompsons’ album, “Like Some Cool River.” Wish I owned it. A young Thompson emerges spiritual, heartbreaking, I think around the time he and Linda converted to Sufism. Is this why the pensive quality of his version? May well be.

But tonight, I fly back up the Pike, come home, eject the CD from my player and quickly put it on in my kitchen, where my desk is. I have to write about this, can do nothing else. I the song back on repeat, not wanting it to end. Perhaps it is my obsession that keeps me from getting tired of it. No, no, not tired at all. This repetition does not bore me; rather, I find something more each time it repeats, deeper, deeper into the music. The song ends, spins back, and I know the voice is there. The ethereal Tabor soars above the driving rhythm, and I am transported well beyond the capacity of my own words. This, surely, is sublime.

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Now playing: Oysterband - Night Comes In
via FoxyTunes