Todd DeFeo • Times Like These
Released on April 7, 2001.
- Reach High and Touch the Moon
- What Doesn’t Kill Us (Makes Us Stronger)
- Times Like These
- Happy Tonight
- [Finding Harmonicas]
- Time to Say Good-Bye
All songs written by Todd DeFeo (ASCAP).
Recorded live in Burke Hall in Granville, Ohio, on Feb. 8, 2001.
The Story Behind Times Like These
Released April 7, 2001, Times Like These captures a songwriter at a moment of emotional reckoning. The live EP was drawn from a Feb. 8, 2001, concert at Burke Hall at Denison University in Granville, Ohio.
Todd DeFeo performed for a live audience on piano, harmonica and vocals. Five songs were selected from the 13-song concert: “Reach High and Touch the Moon,” “What Doesn’t Kill Us Makes Us Stronger,” “Times Like These,” “Happy Tonight” and “Time to Say Good-Bye.”
The release also preserved “Finding Harmonicas,” a humorous moment when DeFeo searched for the correct harmonica before continuing the set.
The songs occupy the space between holding on and letting go. Night imagery, fading dreams and unanswered questions recur throughout, moving the record from fragile optimism toward an inevitable farewell.
Many of the songs performed that night were intended for later studio recording, but those sessions never happened. Several were never revisited, leaving the Burke Hall tape as their principal surviving document. Intimate and unpolished, Times Like These finds meaning not in resolution, but in remaining present when everything feels uncertain.