More Than Shapes

In the winter of 2011, Victoria VanBruinisse came up with a crazy idea to invite John Roderick of The Long Winters over for a potluck dinner. He played a few songs, told some stories, and ate all of the food.

A few of those moments have been put together into a video collection called "More Than Shapes," named for a song and a story from that evening.

The "musician playing in the living room" isn't a new genre, but there is something special about this musician, at this particular moment in his life that made these performances feel alternately cavalier and humble.

When we asked questions John's answers were thoughtful and introspective, and he played songs with the attention of a musician who was as much reacquainting himself with his music as he was performing it for an audience. To me that relationship has always been the draw of seeing Roderick perform; the shared catharsis in the connection between a performer's desire to play and a listener's need to hear it.

So, yeah: this is another musician playing songs in a living room, but to those in attendance at a good friend's house sitting in front of the fireplace, it felt like more than that. More than shapes.

This project wouldn't have been possible without collaborating on visuals with cameraman Tyler Kalberg, and the audio recording by Zach Varnell, both of whom you should know from their excellent Notes from Home video series.

Songs from that night will be posted here every Tuesday in February.