My Nerdoir

Midway through the wonderful song, “The Cutter,” by Echo and the Bunnymen, an amazing drone roars to life, filling the air and never failing to raise chills on my skin. I always thought it was distorted bagpipes, but today I discovered that it is actually an eastern violin played by Lakshminarayana Shankar.

I love that sound – the same roar of cicadas on a sweltering Texas afternoon, rising and falling in accompaniment to the landscape shimmering through the waves of heat.