Craig Finn: "Respective Coasts"

The musician's contribution to the 2012 Esquire Songwriting Challenge

VIDEO AND PHOTOS BY DANNY CLINCH /// BY ANDY LANGER

Buy the full song and raise money for Big Brothers Big Sisters

Danny Clinch

FOR THE UNINITIATED:

It's easy to see why everyone from bespectacled indie-rock fetishists to a guy named Bruce Springsteen are so fanatical, even evangelical, about Finn and his Brooklyn-based band the Hold Steady: The spotlessly spun anthems, meditations, and travelogues perfectly catalog the highs and lows of derelicts, dopers, drunks, and, increasingly, couples in various states of love (Sean and Shannon, Dennis and Billy, and, in his original song for Esquire, Kevin and Heather). This year, the forty-year-old frontman will be splitting his time between touring with the Steady and supporting his solo debut, Clear Heart Full Eyes.

ON GOING SOLO:

"It's been the challenge I was seeking. I wanted to create a little discomfort and give myself a new perspective on making music with other people. And it made me confident. With the Hold Steady, it sometimes feels like someone writes a riff and I yell over it. I found myself asking, Am I a songwriter or a guy that yells and throws words down? This lets me do some different things."

ABOUT THE SONG HE WROTE FOR ESQUIRE:

"Kevin and Heather have had a breakup. Heather went back to California and Kevin remained in New York. It's a bad breakup, but they still talk on the phone. She says he's allowed to call up to 3:00 A.M. in New York because she goes to bed at midnight in California. It's the story of how they're holding on to each other despite the anger. And I liked this idea of the couple kind of going back to their corners — like in a boxing match. The phone scenario is the first thing I thought of. I used to have kind of a bad walk home in Brooklyn from the subway to the apartment, and sometimes I'd want a little company, so I'd call my friends out west to have someone to talk to at 2:00 A.M. The three-hour time difference coast-to-coast can make itself useful."