The Lowest of the Low has been my favorite band since I first heard them on 102.1 The Edge (Toronto) in 1994, when I was a freshman in high school. I had plans to see them in Buffalo, but they (tragically) broke up a mere two weeks before the show. However, Ron Hawkins, the amazing lead singer, still plays solo acoustic shows here in the Buff, so I've had my chance to experience his beautifully seductive voice first-hand a couple times. The song he wrote that most inspires me is "Rosy and Grey." It's about a man who just got out of the army, and comes back to Toronto. His relationship with his girlfriend is uncertain, but he has been with her "for more than eight years," filled with "laughter . . . and tears." He doesn't seem to mind if they break up (he will of course be heartbroken]), but he considers the time he did spend with her so life-altering that even that little bit will suffice for a lifetime of satisfaction. Progress is another theme of the song "they're puttin' down roads / and they're brokering stocks," which fits with the idea that he can handle not being with her; it is all for the sake of progress. As we can tell from his other songs ("A Letter from Bilbao," e.g.), he is a very well-traveled man, which he reiterates in this song with quite possibly the single most passionately erotic verse ever written:
Well I've kissed you in France and I've kissed you in Spain
I've I've seen the sun go down on Sacre Coeur
But I like it much better going down on you
The song is almost naively hopeful, but that makes it all the better. Ron can write like few others can, I honestly wish his new band, The Rusty Nails, would disband so he could return to his solo career. |
