This painting hung in the control room at the original Daytrotter studio for the longest time. It just kind of showed up; I can’t remember when or how we got it, though we know who gave it to us. It became one of the only things hanging in that tiny space. Anytime a band came in to hear playback and decide if that take was the take—no editing, no mixing—they had to accept it as is or start again from the top. We’d sit on our little booth bench while Mike, Pat, or Brad hit the playback button, listening with the painting staring back at us. Other than tapes and a few odds and ends, that was the whole room. This was an old radio-station control room, very small, and the painting felt like our company. The image looks like a troll goblin eating small balloons—maybe Christmas lights or flowers. There’s a flag that resembles a red taco anteater with music notes, and an albino Grover and a regular Grover holding hands, just afloat at sea. For years it watched every take.