Heading north through the satellite towns of Connecticut; most of them urban sprawls where houses and industrial units co-habit before giving way to power-relay-stations and breaker’s yards. Stamford, Bridgeport and New Haven go past in a blur, interspersed with leafier communities gloriously decked out in the red, gold and green tones of the season Americans like to call Fall.
I’m halfway to Boston on a silver Amtrak train and have spent the last 2 hours talking to fellow travellers at my table. One of them, an insurance claim specialist for casinos, talks of million dollar deals and reminisces of world travel as a college student, way back before children and responsibility. She cannot bear silence, reads her incoming texts out loud and comments on everything from the graffiti on bridges to the obscene shape of a tower we pass. She just got off at the last stop and although I welcomed the silence for the first 10 minutes, now I kind of miss her.
We pass the General Dynamics nuclear submarine plant in New London and make a brief stop in the enigmatically named Mystic, famous for its rope works. All this insider info – the submarine plant, the rope works – I know because people tell me. As we leave New York and the countryside opens up, so do the people. After days in a city where they’ve avoided all contact with strangers they’re talking and becoming human again.
And Bostonians LOVE to talk. I’m having breakfast in a diner on South street and the tone is loud and raspy. If I opened the multi-metre app on my phone (no self respecting musician should be without one) it would show a range of frequencies markedly different to those your ears would be subjected to in a Paris bistro a London pub or a Tokyo sushi bar.
As if to illustrate the point, the girl sitting next to me at the counter has the following to say about an ex-boyfriend.
“My mom hated him ‘cause he whispered. She’d go:
He’s a schmuck!! You wanna say something, SHOUT IT OUT THEN OPEN THE WINDOWS SO THE NEIGHBOURS CAN HEAR!!”
Last night’s mammoth 3 hour set at the Be Bop has left my voice in tatters so I’m happy to be somewhere I can just listen…
Barton
French version published daily on the ROCK MADE IN FRANCE website:
October US tour day 5 – Boston girl talk : « Elle ne supporte pas le silence »
