Our pal Andrew has already sung the praises of the anti-folk genius Jeffrey Lewis, but I need to chime in as well.

My first exposure with Lewis was the video below, which absolutely seized control of my life minutes after watching it. Thank god You Tube doesn’t monitor how often I view a clip, because if they did I’d be embarrassed how many times I’ve watched it. Same thing with this video as well, but that’s another story.

Jeffrey Lewis - “Williamsburg Will Oldham Horror”

There are so many amazing lines in that song that it’s a little staggering to digest them all in one sitting. Few songs sum up the struggle and compromise of living an artistic lifestyle like Lewis does here, plus it warns listeners that confronting a Will Oldham lookalike inside a subway car is probably a bad idea.

After you become obsessed with Lewis—like we all have here—you’ll probably want to watch this crude live performance of “The Chelsea Hotel Oral Sex Song.” Lewis pens an entire song based on Leonard Cohen’s most famous lyric, but unlike Quebec’s finest singer, he didn’t get any action on that unmade bed (“First get the oral sex, then write the song after”).

Jeffrey Lewis opens for the Mountain Goats tonight at Doug Fir.