Has it been another year already? Time ticks by as we sit on the couch and sweat through another 365 days of eating ding-dongs and watching Supermarket Sweep.

But time passing doesn't always have to be one giant buzzkill. It's also time yet again for another Pitchfork Fest. Go click on that link to see the stellar line-up this year. And we've decided of all the bands playing this superb festival, we're only going to highlight Sharon Van Etten. Why? Well, why wouldn't we?

Right now, I've had it with rock 'n roll. Right now, I'm giving it up. Because right now, I just want to listen to the (in her own spot-on words) "sad prairie folk music" of Sharon Van Etten forever.

Her beautiful voice is slow and sad and soothing and so the break I need from lo-fi punk and all that RULING and SLAYING and BRUTAL junk. I mean, do I have to be going 180 mph all the time when I listen to music and go to shows? Can't I just go 25 down an old country road while the radio plays the often heartbreaking ballads of Sharon Van Etten?

I want to travel over a nice, idyllic bridge while listening to this. If the leaves were changing and there was also a steady breeze shifting the overgrown grass as my car passed, well, those would be added pluses too.

And who knows, maybe listening to this peaceful folk comes closer to some kind of the self-transcendence I've always been after. You know, knowing the world is a cold and lovely place with chaotic order and all that sort of thing? I'm not sure, but I know I don't often think about such grand ideas when rocking out to riffs that blast to 11.

You will like Sharon Van Etten if you like soft, warm melancholy. And, of course, you will like her if you like singers with beautiful voices. And right now, that's all I like. Sure, I may return to lo-fi SLAYING very soon. But not right now... because right now, I'm listening to Sharon Van Etten. And I'm feeling it.

Sharon Van Etten plays Pitchfork Fest at Union Park, on Friday, July 16th, and also at Schubas, on Saturday, July 17th.