If you read the excellent review, you'll note also that Jake mentions the beauty that is "Workingman's Dead," by the Grateful Dead. Historically punks and goths despise that shit, but you know what? It's an excellent album. If you deride it, you probably haven't ever listened to it. It's truly great Americana. Uncle Tupelo ain't got nothing on it. I inherited this record from my dad, who was never a hippie nor a fan of the Dead. Though there were times in high school, when he and I were barely on speaking terms, that he and I could play Dead songs together on guitar. They were easy.

Actually, my favorite Dead song is "Ripple," which is on their very commercial "American Beauty." It's such a happy song, but to this day when I hear it, it makes me wistful and sad. It made me sad to sing at the time, because all I wanted was to be able to connect with my father in a way that wasn't all about arguing over curfew or boyfriends or noserings or combat boots. Now that I'm older, I have that connection, and maybe the desire that I felt then was a vestige of some Electra stage. Maybe even a bit unhealthy.

Another song he used to play for me was "San Francisco Bay Blues," one of those open-source type tunes everyone and their brother has played. He learned it from Ramblin' Jack Elliott. My boyfriend at the time was a sorta-tough biker/tattoo artist guy who also loved folk and old timey. My dad loved him, despite the engineer boots and the leather jacket (I never let him take it off inside my house lest my folks see his tattoos), and they would stand over the stove in the kitchen and discuss the proper way to make sauce. One night, after dinner, we had our guitars out (no, we were NOT hippies, I must repeat) and he asked my dad if he knew "San Francisco Bay Blues."

"My dad used to play it for me," he added. His father had been murdered a few years earlier.

My dad, always enjoying the limelight, played it for us. My boyfriend listened and discreetly wiped his eyes.

San Francisco Bay Blues, by Ramblin' Jack Elliott.