Show review: Dwight Twilley at the UFO Factory on Friday, March 24

The last time I heard Dwight Twilley on the radio it was the mid-80s and I was bouncing around the backseat of my mom's Lincoln Town Car on the way to pick up a ham from the meat shop. This was before seat belts were in. I remember wondering what it meant to be on fire, or what it meant when someone said they were “on fire.”


Since then, I've asked myself a million times where the clear melodies and pertinent harmonies of that time have gone. Is there a place where sub-genre goes to die, or does it get reincarnated as another unrecognizable pool of dark sludge? Where does work ethic fit into today's tropes? The two used to have so much in common. Twilley's tunes, old and new, remind of us this. You have to work for the song, and once it's written, you have to work for the performance of it. You can never stop “Looking for the Magic,” because if you do, you can't expect the magic to find you.


Dwight Twilley came to the UFO Factory on Friday, March 24, and reminded us that not only should the music reside in our hearts, but that our hearts should reside in the music. Where he goes, a wake of enduring melody follows.