The Bollard Bulletin for Nov. 24, 2025
Local Music Monday: Letter to Andrew LaVogue
Local Music Monday
Dear Andrew,
Thank you for sending me a series of e-mails this month regarding your new album, Dandelions and Other Love Songs. Although we’ve never met, I was also gratified to learn your life is still going great. As you noted, your past albums have been reviewed by other Maine media outlets, and I read the rapturous write-up in the Press Herald from the fall of 2022 in which you’re quoted saying you and your wife have “gotten lucky in every possible way” since moving here from rural Ohio in 2015. I didn’t need to know that much about your sex life, but again, glad for your happiness.
Of Dandelions, you wrote to me, “This album is primarily about the love in my life. From spreading love, to my friends, to my wife Kelsey, to my new born son and to my mother.” That’s lovely, dude. And the record sounds lovely, eight mostly mellow instrumentals played on acoustic and electric guitars with some keyboard tones and hand-drumming in the background. I have no doubt all the loved ones you list above love, or at least appreciate, these songs — though, naturally, the section of “Circles” that gets loud and almost raga-ish might upset an infant.
That’s actually my favorite part of this album, mostly because it defied my expectation and almost nothing else here did.
I learned some wisdom as a teen from a guitar teacher who told me the magic of music — the actual reason humans like it — is the way it either satisfies or defies the listener’s expectation of what the next note or rhythm or section will be. As a composer, you know this, and have generally chosen the safest, most satisfying path at every juncture, eschewing detours into challenging sonic territory. As a guitarist playing in the American primitive style of John Fahey, you definitely know this, since that style is characterized by its incorporation of darker toned, minor- and odd-key notes into traditional folk and country-blues melodies, and you are competent in that style.
The trick, my teacher explained, is to write music that both satisfies and defies expectations, to keep it pleasant but interesting. The songs on Dandelions are more pleasant than interesting to my ears.
Wishing you continued happiness and lots of luck,
Chris
Highlights
Interesting rock-doc on the big screen at SPACE (538 Congress St., Portland) tonight. The Gits tells the tragic story of the titular Seattle punk-rock band of the early ’90s whose influential frontwoman, Mia Zapata, was murdered in 1993. Since overshadowed by the untimely demise of other Pacific Northwest acts like Mother Love Bone and Nirvana, The Gits get their due in this 20th anniversary re-release that shows at 7 p.m. Tix: $10.