You can make Tuscan Chops without fresh sage leaves but you should not. As a river without fish is only water running downhill, the Chops without fresh sage are only pork chops fried with garlic.

     But to walk out in the first brisk dusk, a jazz record carrying thinly through the screen door, the grass cold under your bare feet, and to snip the broad, living leaves of sage from the garden, stacking them in your palm like pages of summer, their trichomes standing up in soft and minutely patterned resinous velvet, redolent of so many good things — Artemisia Ludoviciana, the prairie sage you have crinkled into the patch pocket of your snap shirt on rivers across the Mountain West; the pine forests of Northern Wisconsin that you wandered as a boy; the tightly coiled smudge you buy on the road every winter at the little country store in Tesuque, NM, and bring home to consecrate dark mornings by the wood stove — and then to bring the leaves in and toss them into a hot skillet with olive oil and a little butter until they become crisply translucent, small panes of stained glass scattered over a well turned pork chop, with rice and a simple pan sauce. Well, there is grace itself.

     We dropped the kid off at college, came home and wept. In the morning we hiked up our pants and started after our work, having our coffee together and convening again in the evenings to make the ritual of supper, and remember the antediluvian pattern of life.

     We must have found the recipe in a magazine not long after I moved out here, twenty-odd years ago. But we haven't looked at it in years, and we've deconstructed and elaborated upon whatever it was. The recipe is elementary and like so many of the best, depends more on grammar — time, temperature, order of operations — than on wizardry. The best food is peasant food, older than the Bible, and more forgiving.

MIDWEST – In October we'll tour the great Midwest, with shows in WI, MI, IL, MN, and ND, in the trio formation with John Convertino on the drums and Erik Koskinen on electric guitar. We start (10/14) at the Trempealeau Hotel, Trempealeau, WI. and play (10/15) Anodyne, Milwaukee WI. (w/Whitney Mann), (10/16) Stoughton Opera House, Stoughton, WI. (w/Whitney Mann), (10/17) Cedar Lounge, Superior, WI., (10/18) The Ore Dock, Marquette, MI., (10/20) the Stone Arch Sessions, Appleton, WI., (10/21) FitzGerald’s, Berwyn, IL., (10/22) Parkway Theater, Minneapolis, MN. (w/Molly Dean), (10/23) at Muiderman Guitars, Thompson, SD. (10/25) Sanctuary Center, Fargo, MN. (put on by our friends at the Jasper Hotel).

WEST COAST – In November we'll pick up the tour out in California and make our way up the long coast. The first half of the tour we're delighted to have Kris Delmhorst joining the band (in addition to opening the show as our special guest in Felton and Berkeley) while the second half of the tour John and I will drill down on the duo format. We start 11/05 at McCabe’s Guitars, in Santa Monica, CA. (w/Niamh Regan) and make our way north to play (11/06) at Ojai Underground Exchange (this show will be broadcast via a ticket paywall at the link) Ojai, CA. (w/Niamh Regan), (11/07) Felton Music Hall, Felton, CA. (w/Kris Delmhorst), (11/08) Freight & Salvage, Berkeley, CA. (w/Kris Delmhorst), (11/09) Arcata Playhouse, Arcata, CA., (11/11) The Belfry, Sisters, OR. (11/12) The Shedd, Eugene, OR. (11/13) Millers, Carnation, WA. w/Sarah Gerritsen (11/14) Trout Lake Hall, Trout Lake, WA. w/Janis Carper (11/15) The Showdown, Portland, OR. (w/Taylor Kingman).

GRAND MARAIS – In early December I'll fly out to Minnesota to headline the annual Grand Marais Ol' Opry (12/5) at the Arrowhead Center for the Arts in beautiful Grand Marais, MN., on the north shore of Lake Superior, with a pick-up band comprised of old friends Mike Lewis (who produced and played saxophone on The Universal Fire), J.T. Bates, Eric Heywood, Erik Koskinen, and Barbara Jean Meyers, leaning a little more on the country side of my deal. We'll round out the night after opening sets from locals Dead North, and the Spruce Roots. Lock up some tix now, make the drive.

SPOTIFY – I recently took down some of my albums from Spotify (certain early albums were distributed by other parties), and when I can, I'll take the rest of them down. At one point I had over 400k unique listeners per month on Spotify, and for a while this brought in about $3k per quarter – that is, roughly $12k per year, or $4k under the poverty line, for the whole of my life's work – from having my music streamed for the equivalent of forty years time, every year. Does this represent a pay cut and remove my billboard from the busiest highway in streaming music? It does. But here's the deal: Spotify sounds awful (you hear about 80% of what you should), pays shit, and prejudices its algorithm against new and independent music in favor of copyrights held by corporate interests. It recently started cracking down on and labeling AI slop, but only in response to a backlash; before that it went all-in on AI as another way to avoid paying human beings for their work. Spotify is bad for music and musicians, bad for the world. Other platforms sound better and pay more fairly. Apple Music is better, TIDAL is better, they all have the same music. You can quit Spotify, we're only hostage by consent. Apply this lesson to the body politic.

     We'll see you out there, or hope we will. As always, send this letter to your friends in the places we're headed, and let them know we're coming through town, and we enjoy cold beer just like anyone.