No. 111 - Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s “Skeleton Key” changed my life

Daniel Rosler unlocks the confidence to sing

Oct 10, 2025

This Song Changed My Life is an independent music publication featuring weekly essays from people all around the world about the songs that mean the most to them. Created (and illustrated) by Grace Lilly.

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The Dust of Retreat | Margot & The Nuclear So and So's | Richard Edwards

• 4 min read •

They had the weirdest band name I had ever seen: Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s. Thanks to whatever indie music blog I was haunting in 2007, I discovered their song “Skeleton Key.” I was hooked from the moment I heard the hypnotic, back-and-forth drum pattern that opens the track. Shortly after the percussive introduction, a cello line plays off of a clean, arpeggiated picking pattern before both become submerged beneath a tremolo-drenched guitar melody. Then, the vocals enter: “I did a sick, sick thing to my love.”

At that moment, everything changed.

My musical trajectory had been defined, up to that point, by an eclectic mix of goals. Initially, I just wanted to know how a guitar worked, so I had my dad teach me some chord shapes and basic songs (“Help!” being the first song I learned). I enjoyed it but only became convinced that I wanted to pursue guitar further when I saw local bands performing at the Y.M.C.A in Carbondale — particularly the band Melded. I was devouring Weezer’s discography and had been raised on a diet of The Beatles and pop radio, so melody was everything to me. (I was also obsessed with the Christian-Punk band MxPx and playing fast power chords — I was a weird kid.)

However, I eventually stumbled upon the likes of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, B.B. King, Robert Johnson, and Buddy Guy — which changed everything. I became obsessed with learning how to play the blues. I remember finding my cream-colored Fender Stratocaster tucked behind the citrus-scented, Concolor Fir Christmas tree, which I desperately wanted because my favorite blues guitarists played the Strat. I spent hours practicing minor pentatonic scales, learning blues box patterns, and trying to improvise solos.

Daniel’s band, A Fire With Friends, performing in 2012

Then things changed when I started my first real band, No West, with my cousin, Brendan. I found myself becoming more interested in, and inspired by, various indie bands. Now, I wanted to know how to write the arpeggiated melancholy of Death Cab for Cutie; the melodic tapping patterns of Minus the Bear; the icy, jagged, and angular guitar riffs of Bloc Party. That became my focus: writing the coolest guitar parts I could while hoping to serve the song. For several years, this was my life: playing guitar in a local band was all that I cared about.

Then things changed — again.

For one, Bob Dylan had entered my world. I tried to understand how he wrote songs. I started thinking more about songwriting and less about being technically proficient on the guitar. Shortly after, I found Margot and fell immediately in love. I did not know you could make music like this. The term “chamber pop” was not yet part of my music vocabulary. They were a large band with eight members, mixing the four-person rock music I was so accustomed to with beautiful layers of strings, percussion, acoustic guitar, brass, and the warmth of a Fender Rhodes piano.

After discovering “Skeleton Key,” I immediately drove to Borders bookstore and found their CD, The Dust of Retreat, which had the most stunning album artwork by the wonderful Stacy Novak. I became obsessed with how Richard Edwards wrote these songs — somehow fusing the folk of Dylan with the pop sensibilities of Paul Simon and even Weezer. The melodies were gorgeous, sometimes sung in harmony with a female vocalist. I needed to know how I could replicate what I was hearing — my imagination was on fire. I practically lived on the fan-run message board, “Paper Kitten Nightmare.” I hunted down rarities, demos, live performances. I wanted to make my own version of this.

But the idea of singing terrified me.

I couldn’t imagine ever feeling confident enough to perform my own songs in front of people. It wasn’t until I got drunk in my friend Mike’s basement and sang some of my clunky songs to my inebriated buddies that I gained the confidence to move forward.

Daniel and Sophie Pomeranz at an open mic in 2008

Things happened quickly: I met Sophie Pomeranz (oddly enough, I think at Borders). She and I started working on my songs together, writing music outside or, when it got cold, in my mother’s cherry-red 2000 Dodge Caravan. Soon I found enough confidence to sing with Sophie in front of other human beings at some local coffee shop open mics.

Not long after, we ran into my local music hero and now longtime best friend, Ed Cuozzo, at Denny’s in Dickson City, PA. He was feeling down after police shut down a show he was playing hours away from home and decided to join Sophie and me for a rehearsal on the Lackawanna River Heritage Trail late at night. We sang my songs in three-part harmony, and it felt like magic. We decided to start a band and named it A Fire With Friends. The band grew to seven people and established some of the best friendships I’ve ever had in my life. We toured, we opened for bigger bands, we made records together. We developed a humble following. We even released a new EP this year.

And here I am today, so grateful for it all: the musical opportunities I’ve enjoyed, the innumerable adventures, the lifelong friendships, the solidarity within our arts community, the other bands I’ve started or joined, albums I’ve released — none of this would have happened without the melodic twisting and turning of “Skeleton Key.” ◆

About Daniel

Daniel Rosler writes, sings, and plays guitar in the bands Esta Coda and A Fire With Friends. He’s a Ph.D. candidate in English Literature at Lehigh University and the lucky dad of two great kids: Nora and Eli.

Instagram @danielrosler

⭐ Recommended by
James Barrett (No. 070)

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