09-12-2003

Quintin Nadig

"Five digressions"

A perfectly designed, sober and dark sleeve: that's how one first sees Quintin Nadig's debut album "Anchor Details". And when it comes to listening to it -- delicate folk music from the countryside, with an acoustic guitar and sometimes a banjo, a piano, a cello, and an accordion.

These are the five words that Quintin Nadig picked:
November
Rock n' Roll
Impulse
Ming Kang
Gibbous


November
Blue and gray... with a certain natural sadness. I recently moved back to Illinois from the South-East Coast and I'm soaking up November, preparing for a cold winter.


Rock n' Roll
Someone recently asked me, "What is Rock n' Roll?" I confidently began to answer, then found myself stumbling over band names and songwriters and then I, finally, answered, "Good Question.... I don't know." I was reminded of walking down "dump hill" (a back street in Hanover, IL- a tiny town in North-Western Illinois) as a child one hot 4th of July evening. I was heading down the hill to my Grand Mother's house after the parade when I heard, over the laughter and chatter, a cover band playing at the Fireman's Dance. The song was Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock n' Roll." I wasn't exactly sure what "old time Rock n' Roll" was, but I knew that I liked it.


Impulse
Beautiful, exciting, dangerous.


Ming Kang
Now there's a name I haven't heard for quite some time... I guess, Five or Six years. I was living in an apartment off of Mulford in Rockford, IL. ...a low-income/ government subsidized apartment complex. We were an interesting lot. On Saturdays, when I was able to sleep in, I'd often be stirred awake from the sharp commands of my neighbor demanding her children to eat their cereal. Their kitchen must have been next to my bedroom... and the walls seemed paper-thin. Anyway, once in a while, I'd get some junk mail for Ming Kang. I wondered about that name and wrote:

Ming Kang
doesn't live here,
anymore.

I've loved that name ever since... and for some reason that old faceless
name, Ming Kang, is on my mind, again.


Gibbous
I like this word. I like its progress. I like that there's a nice bright gibbous moon, tonight, glowing of my sleepy town.