Brian, been lovin' the Patty Griffin music. This last one, the live "Top Of The World" is one of my favorites of her songs, along with "Not Alone." Really powerful stuff, from a terrific artist.
Powerful is a good word Dino. When I first heard her debut, Living With Ghosts, back in 1996, I was stricken. A lot of power on that album from just her and her acoustic guitar.
The story goes that she recorded all of those songs with a band after getting the record deal, but the record company liked her demos better so they just released those.
In the song you mentioned, Not Alone (during the verse beginning as below) you can faintly hear a siren in the background. Somehow it happened at just the right time because it seems to fit in that verse:
One of them bullets went straight for the jugular vein
There were people running, a flash of light
Then everything changed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMOQkQZUmIA
My favorite from LWG is Forgiveness...and I think it’s certainly one of her most potent and poetic songs:
We are swimming with the snakes at the bottom of the well
So silent and peaceful in the darkness where we fell
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvdV3W8Q1yU
As good as her folk oriented albums are, she really knows how to rock too. I’d like to see her do another more rock oriented album like Flaming Red and Silver Bell.