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YOU LIKE ‘CODEINE’ TRAMPLED BY TURTLES FANS DISHED ON THEIR FAVORITES

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DULUTH SKYWALK

DULUTH SKYWALK

BY CHRISTA LAWLER

PHOTOS BY CLINT AUSTIN

Codeine, codeine, it’s the nicest thing you’ve … heard. The News Tribune informally polled strangers, friends, colleagues and Twitter-heads to determine Trampled By Turtles’ best song before the band played a homecoming show at Bayfront Festival Park in early July.

“Codeine,” from Trampled’s 2005 album “Blue Sky and the Devil,” is seemingly the fan-favorite.

It got a nod from local musicians. It’s not just Ryan Nelson’s favorite, it’s also the first song he heard by the band — back in the MySpace era.

“That was how I got a chance to listen to local bands as I was slowly getting my skateboard-shoe clad foot in the door,” said Nelson, The Farsights’ drummer.

It’s in Gabriel Douglas’ top picks, too. The 4onthefloor founder offered up his rankings via Twitter: “Midnight on the

Interstate,” followed by “Codeine,” followed by “The Middle,” followed by “The Good Land.”

Speaking of “The Middle” — that’s how Trampled By Turtles opened its sold-out show on a warm-warm Saturday night. The concert was the band’s first mega-event back at its point of origin. They headlined a bill that included Charlie Parr, Bad Bad Hats, The Last Revel, Superior Siren and Teague Alexy Band.

The park was packed, an ore boat did that pass-behindthe-stage thing, and the beer tent served Trampled Golden Ale, a collaboration between the band and Bent Paddle Brewing. And, through some twist of fate, there wasn’t a mosquito in sight at the Harborside venue where the band had been playing a regularly-scheduled summer show before taking a break from touring together.

Duluth Hearts Duluth

As for other fan-favs: Buy local.

Local music fan-pilot-writer-outdoors enthusiast Eric Chandler said he loves all the songs that mention Duluth, including “Duluth.”

“But the song that gets me is ‘Bloodshot Eyes,’” he said. “Perfectly captures how lost and lonely you can feel sometimes. The last lines just slay me every single time: ‘And lie on the earth / for better or worse / let it swallow you whole.’ Every damn time. Even while I was typing it.”

But you don’t have to be living in the 218 to love a Duluth reference. Minneapolis journalist Michael Russo of The Athletic and co-host of “The Russo-Souhan Show” picked “Winners.”

“It depicts Duluth perfectly and beautifully at the end,” Russo said.

He’s talking about the lines “Pretty little city built on the hillside / music in the bars and fire in the sky / We went to the beach and it was covered in ice / And I used to call it home.”

It’s not just that.

“He also lets me use it at the end of my podcasts,” Russo added, referring to singer-songwriter Dave Simonett.

No surprise. The frontman leans sporty.

THOSE WORDS, THO

Speaking of lyrics. Trampled-ites are word-minded folk. Beverly Godfrey, this reporter’s editor, picks “Alone.” She likes the way it starts simply, then builds on itself. It reminds her of how often she will feel one emotion, only to have it shift into another. The lyrics, she said, are sparse, but there is a lot of meaning packed into it.

“Something little can happen that snowballs, layers of complicated wants, needs, thoughts and feelings piling up,” she said. “When that happens, I think it’s good to strip everything down, figure out what’s really important. That’s what I see in this song, a message that’s sad but undeniably true, reminding us to hold on to the people we love.”

For Brooks Johnson, an investigative reporter at the News Tribune, it’s “Victory.”

“Simple melody and soaring fiddle work that parts the clouds, with some help from lines like, ‘Your light in the windowpane said come on in,’” he said.

Jimmy Gilligan of Duluth said the band’s best line of all time is in the lesser known song “Like An Empty House”: “Don’t you tell me honey that your heart is mine / Just tell me how to make it last.”

For Gilligan, Trampled By Turtles plays music that is best enjoyed on the way to an adventure — especially this song. He’s into Erik Berry’s “smooth mandolin stylings” and how the lyrics aren’t all sunshine and rainbows, but also the real and the ugly, he said.

“And (Simonett) sings them so beautifully,” Gilligan said. “I think this is one of the best examples of their solemn, ethereal sound that’s just so catchy.”

Or No Lyrics

For as many people who have found lyrics that resonate, Mike Novitzki of The Local Current’s Duluth chapter, likes one with no words at all: “Sounds Like a Movie,” from Palomino.

“(It) starts out insanely fast and accelerates to a simply unfathomable speed,” he said. “They’ve played it at every show I’ve been to since the release of that album in 2010. It usually comes at about the halfway point of the performance, really showcases each individual member’s mastery of their craft, and signifies to the crowd that playtime is over and s––t is about to get real.

“Most people think it’s just an improvisational breakdown and forget it’s an actual song, but it really kicks the evening into high gear.”

Under Cover

While they have plenty of original material to mine, it can’t be ignored that Trampled can kill a cover — whether it’s the Pixies’ “Where is My Mind” or Radiohead’s “Fake Plastic Trees” or some Grateful Dead.

The band went live on Facebook with a Tom Petty cover the day after his death. No preamble, just the cracking-open of cans and then they filed into the room and began playing “Wildflowers” — which later ended up on a limited edition album and is now available for streaming.

It’s Breanne Tepler’s current pick.

“It was what so many of us needed in those early stages of grief,” said Tepler, who fronts Breanne Marie and the Front Porch Sinners. “I could listen to that on repeat all day.”

It’s the memory of a past concert that sticks with Duluthian Joel Wuorio.

“When they closed with ‘Whiskey’ at Bayfront a few years ago is still my all-time favorite live music experience,” he said via Twitter. v

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