I’ve long been fascinated with the concept of leaving. I find Edward Hopper’s Sun in an Empty Room (see below) particularly moving. I find the Weakerthans song of the same name (which was apparently based on the painting) equally moving. There may be nothing I find so poignant as an empty apartment and that last look. I’m not saying I enjoy it; in fact, I have one hellluva a hard time putting the keys on the counter and closing the door. But I do it time and time again (yeah, there’s a metaphor for relationships in there somewhere, too). Maybe that’s why the opening line to the closing track of Leigh Marble’s latest album, Red Tornado hits me so fucking hard.

After a few somber notes set the tone, Marble sings matter of factly, “Sometimes I strip the bed/ To remember what leaving looks like.” Then he goes on to add, “Now ask me twice/ Is this really what I want to do.” To me, leaving looks like that Hopper image (okay, maybe not as warm and yellow, but surely as empty), and it feels like a blazing warm sun on a cold fall day. But that’s me. For Marble, it looks like a bare mattress; it feels like bitter lyrics (”If your name is mud/ Then at least you know the lay of the land”) wrapped in a tender yearning not to let go; and it sounds like keys crashing down in a ramshackle disaster of noise (which, awesomely, is signaled by a loose whip of savagely distorted guitar).

Of course, I’m speculating about the former (you know, the looks and feelings), but leaving, on this track at least, certainly sounds like the latter. It also includes Marble taking on a welcome throatiness that sounds an awful lot like the Boss on the first, pre-freak out repetition of “what leaving looks like.” It’s a brief change in Marble’s tone, but it sounds to me like someone getting a little froggy ’cause they’re trying to talk while on the verge of tears. And that’s pretty much how the situation in this song has felt any time I’ve had to go through it.

Download audio file (stripthebed.mp3)

Hopper’s Sun in an Empty Room:

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This week’s feature on Marble

Leigh Marble celebrates the release of Red Tornado Thursday, Oct. 18, with Chris Robley and Jared Mees at Holocene. 9 pm. $6. 21+. Image: Marble, taken from his MySpace. Hopper’s Sun in an Empty Room, borrowed from ibiblio.org.