Lieven and how it all started (part 3)

It was the kind of autumn night Belgium has too many of. The eternal rain hitting the window. Empty streets. And a small gas stove unable to win the battle against the cold. The night seemed lost, like so many in that time of student melancholy, until the radio host announced a song by a new band. SPARKLEHORSE was the name. And the song was “HOMECOMING QUEEN“, from a record called “VIVADIXIESUBMARINETRANSMISSIONPLOT” (the host almost choked). I only heard those delicious first chords, and I knew nothing else would ever be the same again. That lost night had given me a treasure I would hold on to for the rest of my life.
Two years later. The kind of summer afternoons that Belgium has too few of. For two years I had been waiting for new music by the genius Mark Linkous. Two years of listening to “Homecoming Queen” and the other gems on endless repeat. The heat had made me tired and lazy, and I was zapping without any destination. Until suddenly I found one of my favorite Dutch TV shows. And there he was, Mark Linkous. Sitting on a chair surrounded by toys. Playing what I had been waiting for most: new songs. I recorded the session on VHS, and I would be watching it a couple of times a day minimum for many weeks. Wishing the arrival of autumn, new songs and rain to remember forever.