Right now, I've had it with rock 'n roll. Right now, I'm giving it up. Because right now, I just want to listen to the (in her own spot-on words) "sad prairie folk music" of Sharon Van Etten forever.

Her beautiful voice is slow and sad and soothing and so the break I need from lo-fi punk and all that RULING and SLAYING and BRUTAL junk. I mean, do I have to be going 180 mph all the time when I listen to music and go to shows? Can't I just go 25 down an old country road while the radio plays the often heartbreaking ballads of Sharon Van Etten?

I want to travel over a nice, idyllic bridge while listening to this. If the leaves were changing and there was also a steady breeze shifting the overgrown grass as my car passed, well, those would be added pluses too.

And who knows, maybe listening to this peaceful folk comes closer to some kind of the self-transcendence I've always been after. You know, knowing the world is a cold and lovely place with chaotic order and all that sort of thing? I'm not sure, but I know I don't often think about such grand ideas when rocking out to riffs that blast to 11.

You will like Sharon Van Etten if you like soft, warm melancholy. And, of course, you will like her if you like singers with beautiful voices. And right now, that's all I like. Sure, I may return to lo-fi SLAYING very soon. But not right now... because right now, I'm listening to Sharon Van Etten. And I'm feeling it.

Sharon Van Etten plays The Music Box, on Sunday, November 14th.