TIme Warp Wednesday: Suzanne Vega's Suzanne Vega

At long last here is the return of a Time Warp Wednesday post.

I don’t really remember where I first heard this album. I originally owned it on cassette. I now have it on vinyl. Suzanne Vega was her first album, and two years before “Luka” became a huge hit.

Suzanne Vega is really a master of painting beautiful character pictures in song. And many of the songs on this album demonstrate this. “Marlene On the Wall” and “The Queen and the Soldier” are great examples of this.

The record leads of with “Cracking,” which to my mind is one of the most beautiful songs she has written. “My heart is broken / It is worn out at the knees / Hearing muffled / Seeing blind / Soon it will hit the Deep Freeze.”

I got the chance to see Suzanne Vega during her Solitude Standing Tour. What a great show. It was a Saturday night and she asked the crowd if we knew what the word of the day was from Pee-wee’s Playhouse. For the record it was “Cool.” Don’t ask me how I remember this, because I really have no idea.

My friends and I waited around by her bus after the show to get her autograph. She was really friendly and gracious and when her band started making noises about wanting to leave she got on the bus and told them to chill out. That was a really nice thing to do for us kids. And I still appreciate her doing that and still listen to her music today.

Marlene On the Wall


Cracking