The song is called “Standard Deviation,” and it’s from the stellar singer-songwriter Danny Schmidt’s album of that name, which is forthcoming next year.

I get sent a lot of troubadour records, and it’s rare that they rise above the just-OK. Schmidt is a clear exception, and he creates story-songs that are wise, insightful and—this is crucial—melodic. On paper, the songs have to many words to be good songs—they read more like short stories. But Schmidt wraps them around some catchy compositions.

I had Danny on my WPKN radio show a while back, talking about his Detroit/Henry Ford song, “Southland Street” (from Enjoying the Fall).

Henry was a man of steel/He built his cars in twos and fours/With a Motown sort of soulful feel/And phatter than before

The factory was made of gold/And all the workers loved him so/And thirteen hour days are slow/But they kept the children fed

Every year at Christmas time/He’d send em home with pork and wine/So sound the horn and ring the chimes/It’s Christmas time again

Refrain: They had it all til it all went south to Southland St./They had it all til it all went headin’ south/Hammer fall and strike the steel and bend the beat/They had it all til it all went headin’ south

Well, he’s done it again with “Standard Deviation.” It’s a song about theoretical physics, string theory, quantum mechanics—and love. A woman with chalk on her nose (calling Madam Curie) doesn’t get taken seriously by the boy’s club. But then she meets a female kindred spirit and, boy, are they attracted to each other.

They touched in ways that no one else could see/The girl’s eyes lit with fire, like milk and kerosene/It was the smartest thing she’d ever heard and the hottest thing she’d seen/So she grabbed her by the brainstem and she threw her to the floor/And they kissed like their equations had never balanced quite before/Cause every lonesome thesis just describes the unobserved/There’s always one who’ll fall upon the tail of every curve/There’s so many locks, so many doors, so many twisted keys Within the standard deviation from the mean.

Here’s the video:

Schmidt swears it’s not simply a feminist song, though it certainly is that. “It’s about two people with very esoteric passions, and most people don’t understand them very well,” he said. “When they meet, it’s incredibly alluring. And, of course, it’s also hard for women to be taken seriously in a male arena like theoretical physics.”

Schmidt compares the encounter to a meeting he had at a songwriter’s conference with a singer who shared his love for college football. OK, well, maybe that wasn’t quite so passionate.

The album should be out in February. Schmidt is currently on the road, in Denver, with his songwriter wife Carrie Elkin (they have a 22-month-old, Maizy; her new album is The Penny Collector). “Standard Deviation” is the first single.

Schmidt is quite successful on Kickstarter, and he raised $27,115 to produce and release the new record. “I’m thrilled to be back in the studio working on a new record,” he told his supporters. “This has been an interesting period in my life, learning to balance music-making with baby-making, and finding a new comfortable rhythm now that Maizy has come into our world. It’s been incredibly humbling, incredibly joyful, incredibly exhausting, and incredibly inspiring. I can’t even remember what I imagined it might be.  But it’s certainly exceeded the foggiest memory of my wildest imagination.”