The Twilight Hours formally request expedited consideration for entry into the Pantheon.
Posted by Matt
As we work to bring wider attention to the band and our album, Stereo Night, John and I have concluded that our best path is to bypass the music business entirely, and make an end run straight for the Pantheon, a place of reward and recognition reserved for musical heroes. With this strategy in mind, we are including in our latest press packages a printed version (PDF 108KB) of this new and updated online plea for expedited Pantheon consideration. You will notice that in the new version of our letter, we have tightened the rhetoric to such a degree that the document’s conclusion is now inescapable: early enshrinement for The Twilight Hours will bring benefits to music in general, and society at large.
It’s vital to note that the band’s interest in Pantheon status is in no way influenced by concern for our own wellbeing. John and I are artists who thrive in an environment tangled with difficulty and strife. We have no interest in reclining on the smooth, warm stones of the Pantheon, watching our bodies regenerate as we drink life-giving nectars. The future of all music is more important to us than a life of pastoral ease.
The blessed and beautiful Mrs. Wilson has pointed out that by achieving number one status on this past week’s edition of Mark Wheat’s The Chart Show at 89.3 The Current, The Twilight Hours may have edged closer to the Pantheon’s doors. But I am fairly sure that we are not yet inside the marble enclosure: none of the expected effects have manifested: increased strength, regeneration of hair, a return to an ideal physical form. John, are you experiencing any of these effects?
Please consider taking a moment of your time to proof read and critique our new plea, responding in the comments to this post. As you will understand, the very health of music, and, in fact, our society, depends on the response of gatekeepers to this document.
Thank you.
27 Comments
I’m dithering!
Doubtless should be changed to doubtlessly.
Still dithering…
Posted by Heisenberg
If, or should I saw when, you are comfortably ensconced in the Pantheon, will you play fewer shows in the Twin Cities? There’s not a lot of nectar and alabaster here and I don’t want to be complicit in cutting off my and my neighbors’ Twilight Hours fix.
-psh
Posted by psh
I’m conflicted about this whole pantheon thing…while I believe it’s true that Matt and John have earned pantheon status just on their pre-stereo night works alone..and I wholeheartedly agree with the blessed and beautiful Mrs. Wilson that their number one status boosts their case tremendously, I don’t know if I’m comfortable supporting their petition at this time…
Posted by Kara
I’m a little wary about believing that if they are enshrined while still alive their musical productivity will grow as well..for some reason this doesn’t ring true….I think I agree more with the Omniscient in that great suffering produces great art…at least in Matt’s case…maybe John(kind of the blimps) is ready for Pantheon status but he is irrevocably harnessed to Matt(shriveled blimp), a burden that John must bear which may in fact be the source of his own musical greatness…
Posted by Kara
...in conclusion…I’m not convinced…!
Posted by Kara
I concur, ascension is inevitable. And languishing in wait seems to be in vain. Yet, the wizened mind will reveal, Pantheon itself is overrated. Enshrinement itself is not the reward of glory achieved, but instead recognition of glory already realized. For the alabaster is here, the relishing of nectar is now. Pantheon is the “Sunny Acres” collective of glory days story tellers. Is the retelling and adulation of the past sweeter than the sweat and grit of the mount? No! Is the statue more glorious than the living Dandy? No! Is the marble smoother than the 400 Bar floor? Ok, yes, but it is not more resplendent! Your Pantheon is here, with the thunder of Roehm pulsing you, the trumpeting Jacques heralding you, the hands of Salmela cradling your very song. Tis the journey exalted, not the coronation. Do not be blinded by the shining light on the horizon, it will illuminate you all soon enough. Instead, be the tabernacle now and let us all be glad!
In other words, play more shows!
Posted by Spike
Yea…you could either languish outside the pantheon, with folks such as Yo La Tengo (INCREDIBLE NEW ALBUM OUT!) and Ween, or be enshrined alongside Yes and Rat.
Selfish bastards, twilight hours need to come to vegas. Get a show here 5 days a week like celine dion. PLEASE!
Posted by Heisenberg
As one representative gatekeeper who just today, in the waxing moon of late October, received his CD copy of Stereo Night, I support your request. But alas, my talented souls, the gate-keepers are a diverse lot—a laity without prelates, including many monotheists for whom which there is only one God—the monolithic force of mediocrity. We must confront the hoi polloi to give Institution to the music of The Twilight Hours. I will pick up a sabre. I will polish my tongue. I will march into battle to fulfill the apotheosis of our beloved northern gentlemen. It will prove a grand task to achieve them into the Incumbency of the Pantheon. But these two cathemeral creatures have been sucking on the teat of independent music for too long. They have earned a pristine spot on the shiny alabaster floor where sun beams bounce off the ripe and polished fruits, sending rays of white eyesight across the room and onto the dangling silver chains, behind of which all of music’s secrets are kept.
Posted by verreauxi
WOW…!!!!!
Posted by Kara
Figuratively-speaking, of course :)
Posted by verreauxi
Cathemeral. And new one for me, and I like it. I assume that describes the sifaka as well as our musical friends.
Posted by psh
This was proofread by my dear girlfriend Patricia. She says this is much better writing than she has to deal with at her workplace. She also now understand why I like what you do so much. You are my musical heroes.
A request for expedited consideration of
The Twilight Hours
for entry into the Pantheon
Dear Gatekeeper,
There exists in our collective heart an alabaster hall of achievement, the keys to which are provided only to music’s acknowledged masters. We call this place the Pantheon. At the end of their lives, musical heroes go to the Pantheon to lie on smooth stones and drink nectar among statues and fountains. Musicians in the Pantheon are allowed to make love to each other at any time. And their bodies are maintained forever in their most ideal form.
Posted by Fran
A musician’s ability to enter the Pantheon is usually determined by the overly slow coalescing of opinion among gatekeepers less enlightened than you. This haphazard process causes many deserving artists to suffer through exhausting careers — only to endure the negative effects of death before the collective wisdom of conventional gatekeepers, shifting at its pre-Minneapolian glacial pace, finally allows them to attain their reward.
And so do
The Twilight Hours formally request
expedited consideration for entry
into the Pantheon.
Posted by Fran
For the purposes of this document, let us stipulate that there will be a time in the future when the greatness of The Twilight Hours will be recognized and the band will be installed in the Pantheon. At that time their translucent and transcendent red vinyl LP, Stereo Night, will be acknowledged by all to be a masterwork for the ages. Now let us go one step and half-step further and admit that this stipulation is true: At some point, The Twilight Hours will enter the Pantheon. Upon gaining access to its healthful nectars, the band members will experience increased strength and bodily regeneration. And if they are still alive at the time of their enshrinement, their musical productivity will grow as well.
Posted by Fran
Logic dictates that if one band’s well-being were to increase, the well-being of all musicians, in the aggregate, would increase. Remember, our musical culture is a living organism whose health has waxed and waned over the course of history. At times, such as during the reign of pop in the early 1980s, it seemed as if Gloria Estefan might actually succeed in “turning the beat around,” twisting music into pieces and killing it. Because such threats to music always exist, we bear a collective responsibility to guard music and nurture it. To help them protect music itself, shouldn’t The Twilight Hours be allowed to drink now the life-giving nectars that will eventually come into their possession?
Posted by Fran
There is more at stake here than the fate of music. We have already accepted that in the future, perhaps after their death, The Twilight Hours will be granted Pantheon status — and so the future is known. But the present is known as well. And who could deny that for the very most unfortunate among us, ours is a time of terrible misery? Let us rise up as a society and leave the sadness of today, jumping and rambling ahead to the certainty of a brighter future when The Twilight Hours have gained their reward.
Posted by Fran
Finally, the advanced ages of the band members make The Twilight Hours a special case for early placement into the Pantheon. It is possible, though unlikely, that their debut album, Stereo Night, will be largely ignored on its release and will only gain renown many years later after the band’s members have been driven insane by the world’s injustice. After a blow like that, these mature musicians may not have time to recover and become productive members of society. On the other hand, if The Twilight Hours were to be immediately enshrined, the band would no doubt begin to earn substantial wages at their live shows, allowing them to focus on recording a second album’s worth of world-benefiting material.
Posted by Fran
Conclusion
Gatekeeper, you among all gatekeepers have the power to move the world ahead — to help us bypass an unproductive period of dithering and evaluation which will yield, ultimately, nothing but an already determined future. Launch us forward to a better time! Take action now by ushering The Twilight Hours through the Pantheon’s marble doors. Grant these deserving musicians, still in their prime, the powerful nectars that will help them save music and perhaps save the world!
Thank you,
Matt Wilson & John Munson
The Twilight Hours
TheTwilightHours.com
Posted by Fran
Maybe a simple listing of the differences in your girlfriend’s proofread would’ve sufficed?
E
Posted by Eric
Honestly, I feel that your best bet is to design and contract a small production run of tiny ceramic figurines. These could be sold online or, ideally, through the Franklin Mint and advertisements in Parade Magazine, etc. The proper ritual use of these figurines by scores of common human beings is known to please the deities and, therefore, hasten one’s arrival in the “pantheon” of one’s choosing.
Posted by Tico
I wish I had studied classical history or languages because I’m probably confusing this. Anyway, your mention of ceramic figurines and ritual use, Tico, made me think of pre-Roman Latin households and how they prayed to of their lares and penates—the clay figures that represented family gods and ancestors. I think they made them for themselves and passed them on from generation to generation and took them when they migrated. Talk about a family heirloom. What a wonderful concept. Now I’m curious about lares and penates. Off to wikipedia…
-psh
Posted by psh
I believe the modern day bobble-head is a classic example of this type of figurine…and I also know that you can get custom-made bobble-heads…perhaps Twilight Hours bobble-heads perched upon our mantles will do the trick!
Posted by Kara
Nice. I want a Matt Wilson bobble-head with the high note lip curl going on. You know what I’m talking about.
Posted by psh
Oh yeah!
Posted by Kara
Although I profoundly believe in the power of small ceramic figurines (and English lawn trolls, so beloved by the petty-bourgeoisie in the UK), I think a short study of Greek tragedy is more apropos for our TH lads. Sadly, even high consciousness of hubris doesn’t extinguish its consuming flames. It may be better to dance around the bonfire, lips-a-quiver, in loincloths of fur and satin.
Posted by Tico
Kara, if you don’t vote for pantheon induction, we are fucked. get with the program girl!
Posted by John
I won’t be rushed by the Resentful Shovelsman….!!!
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