It's Gold Dust Week!

Happy July, everybody! New day, new month, new hopes.

For awhile now July has been synonymous in my head with Gold Dust. And why wouldn’t it be? It’s a song about 4th of July. A conglomeration of my 4th of July experiences in St. Louis at Bluebird Park. Have you ever been?

In my memory they look a lot like these photos do. There’d be a big handful of us. And there’s something magical about it because it was such a community event. I remember going to downtown St. Louis one 4th of July when they called it the VP Fair. But the breadth and size of that spectacle didn’t have the same impact. The buzz and thrill of a shared experience in your neighborhood, the anticipation you felt when you were younger and were sure they felt, too. The darkness darkness darkness and you hear the concussion of the firework and you track it’s squiggly ascent but you don’t know exactly when it’s gonna burst and you don’t know what it’s gonna look like but you know you’re about to be surprised and you agree to this.

And then it’s dark again. You look around you when a few of ‘em are in bloom up there and you can faintly make out other shapes and shoulders of people in the glow. All of them, like you, committing to a moment of surprise and magic. That hits more for me. Viscerally, that’s how I remember it most.

So all this week I invite you to listen to Gold Dust and crank it up. Share it on your socials. I think my producer and friend Ross Christopher did such a beautiful job capturing the depth and flow and loft of this moment with the instrumentation. Wonderfully done. Sit with the words and the strings, and my hope is they steep into your thoughts and take you to a place when you were younger when things were safer, lighter. I hope there is a romantic glow there waiting for you like there is for me when I sing it. And in that glow…sneak a peek. Look around, and bask in the joy all around you.

My favorite lyrics in Gold Dust are in the bridge:
”Fireworks fall from the sky

Like the Grande Finale on the 4th of July

Emeralds burst and the crowd is hushed

And there’s Gold Dust falling all around us

And we.

Hold our breath.

Because it’s almost gone!

Look up…Look up…”

I want to know what your 4th of July experiences were like. It’s a day a lot of Americans have fond memories of. Leave me a story in the comments - take me to where you’ve been. Thanks!