We Gathered in Spring – Midlake

In New Zealand, this week has witnessed the beginning of sprinter. The daffodils are flowering, and the washing is drying in the sunny breeze.
In New Zealand and Australia, some weather scientists have attempted to change our weather paradigm to a five season year, especially as climate change affects our seasons. Summer, autumn, and winter remain intact, but now winter leads into sprinter, and sprinter into summer. I like the theory, partly because I enjoy using the terms sprinter and sprummer, as they’re both pretentious and humorous sounding, but it does have some effects on the terminology of music.
Antoni Vivaldi would have had to have written the Five Seasons. Bruce Springsteen would become Bruce Sprintersteen, and Buffalo Springfield would become Buffalo Sprummerfield. And this song from Midlake’s excellent The Trials of Van Occupanther, could become ‘We Gathered After Winter’.
Midlake are a Texas based folk band, and 2006’s Van Occupanther is their second album. The band members came from a jazz background, but the sound of Van Occupanther has been compared by critics to Bob Welch era Fleetwood Mac.