First: Find you someone who loves you the way Michael Trotter Jr and Tanya Blount-Trotter love each other.
Second: Give a listen to their new album as The War and Treaty, Hearts Town, a record that is not at all directly about the state of the world but which still functions as a portal through which we can all see that state. Listening to people sing to each other about their love and their marriage, you’d think you’d only get percolated. But Hearts Town has so much to say about how people treat each other that the romantic material feels like an entryway into something broader.
I talked to Michael and Tanya at length about the record and about their relationship, and about where they’re going next. You can read the full piece over at No Depression.
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