The Maldives are stupendous 8-man band from Seattle. They played at Birds on a Wire in March 2010, and it was all the theater could do to contain them; something I read about them somewhere described their sound as “Epic Americana”, which just about nails it. “Blood Relations” was one of the most visceral moments in the show—pure rock power that stirred everyone’s blood to move faster, singer Jason Dodson howling beautifully over the band’s astonishing four-axe attack. The song is about the shadow a father casts over his son and his son’s sons. Somebody somewhere is standing on his grave, but all of my children are carrying his name, goes the refrain. It’s a song for men; it gets at the ambivalence that grips us all, at some point, about our fathers. Sadly, most men who put this struggle in their work only wallow in it, never getting anywhere. But “Blood Relations”, I think, is the sound of a man fighting through it, grasping for the peace he knows that is to be had with his father’s shadow—no matter how elusive it may seem.