Besides being the only band we can think of with their own line of Snuggies, Andrew Jackson Jihad is also the first band to dedicate a song to folk singer Linda Ronstadt—to our knowledge.
Taken from AJJ's Christmas Island LP, “Linda Ronstadt” tells the story of losing one's shit in a museum. It's kept a mystery whether singer Sean Bonnette has lost his shit in the colloquial sense or the literal from a bad burrito in Scottsdale, AZ, but that's a recurring theme throughout the band's fifth album—it walks the line of silly and sober. In the case of “Linda Ronstadt”, the blind side of overwhelming emotion brings Bonnette nearly to his knees for reasons he'd not been aware of internalizing. It occurs to him, as he's taken by a video installation of Ronstadt, that “‘I almost made it through a year of choking down my fears” and it brings him to tears in public.
Christmas Island was recorded at Elmwood Studios in Dallas, TX and produced by John Congleton who's worked with St. Vincent, Modest Mouse, and The Mountain Goats.
Sean Bonnette of AJJ had the following to say on the source material for “Linda Ronstadt”:
This is the most factually true song I have ever written. The events described took place in the summer of 2012 at the Musical Instrument Museum in Scottsdale, Arizona. Myself and a companion were disguised as chaperones for a high school field trip. Linda was singing mariachi, she cured my homesickness for quite a while after that. This one was Congleton's favorite.
Andrew Jackson Jihad's Christmas Island is out May 6 on Side One Dummy. For more on Christmas Island go here.
