a coherent collection of random statements regarding God, words and tunes

A light in the middle of the tunnel....

I just posted a shorter version of this story in the comments section of someone else's blog (whose address I decline to post for his own protection .... although y'r capable of finding it yrself....), which in turn prompted me to just go for the gusto....

Yep, I'm going personal again.... although really, the first part of this is a composite of the last several non-musical entries.... although-er, it might also explain why The Scattered Pages have been getting to me so relentlessly the past couple months....

I should also add up front: This gets better as it goes along. Bear with me.

Anyway, to recap a bit: As you might've noticed, I've been working (officially, not my own thing; I'll get to that shortly...) on a product that I'm not at all happy with, and which clearly nobody else wants even if we did it well. I think that's all I want or need to say about that, besides that I'm stuck with, as I've put it to friends here, "midwiving a stillborn child" for another year and a quarter.

On top of that, the next few weeks are looking like a "perfect storm," as I'll be simultaneously reading proofs for Quarter 2, manuscripts for Quarter 3, brainstorming and recruiting authors for Quarter 4 and drafting a scope and sequence for all of Year 2.

(So byrnes, if and when you ever return to mo'time -- how's the first week of April sounding to ya'?)

My own thing: Suffice to say everyone likes the idea and the sample lessons on the table, and the test-run's going pretty well, but barring the miraculous, this (and any other adult curriculum, for that matter) is on hold until next year. And due to the time hole the "official" curriculum has thrown us into, I've written all of one lesson in the past month-plus for the second quarter. After writing the entire first quarter in a little more than two months.

So yeah, I'm kinda frustrated right now. And since I've decided to stop expressing that vocally here, you now are the happy recipients, dear bloggies.

And lest I leave out church-whining, I won't. But I do want to preface it by saying that I'm not angry at anyone this time, and that I don't think this church does a bad job. Quite the contrary. They're scary-efficient in a way that I've never seen in a church before, and the pastor is probably the best week-in/week-out preacher I've ever heard. Seriously.

Which in a way, may be part of the problem. Coming out of 15 years of church-planting has "spoiled" us. We can't punch a clock. We don't LIKE things perfect. Or big. And it's hard to do anything real in the way of ministry with people who do. And in short, it's been a nice vacation from the banging-our-heads-against-a-wall that represented our last church, but that's about it.

Cut away here: My youngest daughter is going on a two-month missions trip with YWAM this summer (and yes, we've gotten all the e-mails and phone calls -- we're an hour from Arvada and two from Colorado Springs and she doesn't have to visit either, thankyouverymuch) to teach English in Romania. After a lot of prayer (and as it was kind of a qualifier to letting her go for that long), God brought someone into her life who just happened to be looking for a trip herself.

A few weeks ago, the two of them went to the friend's church and Bible study. Now, mind you, Amy has been helping considerably at said scary-efficient church with the middle-school group, Sunday School, etc. (Frankly, she was the biggest reason we wound up at said church.) And yet, she came back raving things like "That's the most I've gotten out of a study since we got out here" and (and needless to say, this one got my attention) "That's what I've missed about church plants!"

It's worth prefacing the following by mentioning that this is an ex-biker church who's gone through some REALLY hard times and has pretty much turned over personnel completely (as well as lost their building, which was owned by the pastor who was the source of all said problems -- and it was VERY ugly) over the last year and a half. (It may also be worth adding that Amy's friend's dad was the person who first confronted said pastor. Which got my respect big-time right there. It's also worth adding that he's a big biker guy who hugs a LOT. )

Anyway, we went. Suffice to say, worship was LOUD, and featured the occasional penchant for rewriting classic rock songs into Christianese (example: Bad Company's "Feel Like Making Love" rendered into "Feel Like Praising God," which about a dozen members of the congregation headbanged in front of the band to ). A lot of them still smoke, and a few of them clearly showed up buzzed.

But you know what? There was an unpretentiousness there (and really, can one even USE the word "unpretentiousness" without SOUNDING pretentious? ), a desire to hear, and a genuine sense of GRATITUDE for what God has already done in their lives, even if those lives aren't necessarily "up to Christian code" yet.

In short, I felt like "What the @$&# is the matter with ME?" And was happy just to help break down the chairs afterward.

Oh yeah, and the pastor's message was good, too. 

And something I've learned already: There's no such thing as a pew-warmer at this place. You WILL be involved. Stand up and read. Get over there and pray. NOW. Stop being a Christian only in yr HEAD.

Anyway, maybe we wind up there; maybe we don't. I'm kind of betting on the former right now. (I should add that Marion loved it.) But suffice to say, God used that to talk to me big-time.

And as I wrote this, the following e-mail came from said pastor (they're engaging in a 21-day "fast" currently) arrived -- using my personal favorite verse, no less. I can't help but think it belongs here, then.... and then I'll shut up, which is probably best anyway.... although obviously, it feels good just to write sometimes too....

Posted by: burninglight at 17:19 | link | comments (44)

A toast to the lot of you….

       I just gotta review this thing. It’s already made me smile and broken my heart too many times to not give it its due. And yeah, I’m still playing it.

       Thank eMusic again for the freebie that opened the door here. And to think I almost deleted it. Out came this crabbed voice that sounded like Dave Bazan trying to sound like Jonathan Richman. Which is also to say, my first and understandable reaction was, “Is this guy even trying to sing?”

       But I let it live a bit longer. Then about a minute in, the awkwardness began giving way to atmosphere, suddenly rapturing you up into the chorus as you realize “He sure as heck is singing. And why the heck am I tearing up, anyway???”

  And thus was my intro to “Iris,” the song that opened the gates to all things Scattered Pages, and in this particular case, their 2006 album Lazy Are the Skeletons. And as previously mentioned: Move over Yo La Tengo and Kamikaze Hearts, that “Belated Best Album of 2006” title’s a triumvirate now.

       And incidentally, the singer/songwriter on “Iris,” bassist Kurt Coburn, isn’t the regular lead (although he does regularly appear on a couple other songs per album). That honor belongs to Brandon Hancock, who often writes and sounds (especially on this album) like some Tex-Mex version of Morrissey. Yeah, feel free to read that again. Needless to say, the melancholy here is generally couched in a lot more fun. Or that the considerable fun here gets regularly couched in melancholy. Either works. (And also to say that this is probably the only place west of Manchester where the words “pestilence” and “decadence” are regularly cited, if not flat-out rhymed.)

       Rounding out the lineup is Andy McWilliams, for whom I’ll just quote liberally from their site: “andy mcwilliams is the workhorse of the scattered pages. his load includes, but is not limited to, sound engineering, drumming, mixing, guitar and strings, carpentry, equipment repair, painting and studio upkeep.” (And incidentally, it’s worth visiting their site just to READ said writeups. http://www.scatteredpages.com. Duh.)

       So, on to the cause of my bittersweet glee….

       There’s a fellow ex-Jerseyan/ex-garage band guy who I often share an exercise room with here at work (and, needless to say, have a lot in common with. ) Every time I play this CD (which, by the way, is performed at a perfect workout pace) and he hears the opener, “Alice to Wonderland,” he asks an unusual but appropriate question: “Is this Roy Wood?” Understandable, given Coburn’s heavy fuzz bass here and elsewhere. (For those too young to remember all things Move/Wizzard, think Robert Sledge’s great work all over Ben Folds Five’s Whatever and Even Amen.) It’s fun and eery, more than a little music-hallish while growing into a Coburn-led bass stomp, and in short lets you know you’re gonna be in for one heck of a ride, “And on, and on, and on and on and down and down we go / like Alice to Wonderland, oh no, oh no, oh no….”

       “Deadpan Dirge” might be the former but definitely isn’t the latter. Actually, it’s the first of several songs that tell you that these guys must be a hoot live. After the strummed opening lines, “This where you were born, my dear / And you’ll die here / It’s a criiiiiime….” everyone cuts loose like T-Bone Burnett with a death wish.

        The fun gets upped a notch with the simultaneously winking and stomping country-western/gospel carnival tune “Eternity Waits”:

       Look ye there at the stones
       Gather round ye the bones
       Of a great many kings
       And a great many queens
       Who did oft a daisy pluck
       See now how well they push them up…
      
       And any day mbe your last
       Honey baby, you can bet yr ass
       So don’t linger at the gates
       My darlings, eternity waits.
      
       Siiiiiiiiis-ters aaand bru-HUH-thers…
       Praaaaaaaay fooooooooooor eeeeach uh-HUH-ther….
      
       Seldom has death sounded this fun.

       Which comes in handy, because “The Baptist” – which, to re-introduce the Smiths analogy, sounds like a more relentlessly minor-keyed “Panic” -- turns things a bit darker, and for that matter opens with a image even somewhat more grisly than hanging one’s DJ: “Finish it, she said / And cut off his head / For he’s the reason why / I can’t sleep at night….”

       Then comes the aforementioned “Iris.” Again, picture if you will Jonathan Richman, fresh off that classic first Modern Lovers album and mere days before the breakdown that would hurdle him into permanent second childhood. That’s a lot what this sounds like. Beautiful, fragile, yet determined to try one last time. The pathos of, “She meant a lifetime before I could think twice / And we met a lifetime ago… Now Iris won’t stay at home / And I can’t be left on my own….” gets me every time.

       “I Was Never Someone in Love” brightens things up considerably – musically, anyway:

       You’re wrong
       If you think I ever loved someone
       But go on thinking that if you want
       Everybody knows
       I’m some kind of gigolo…
       I was never someone
       Someone in love
       I never called her name
       I never cried out in pain
       When she tore my heart
       And had so many laughs about it….
      
       Back to those C&W stomps that they need to come to Northern Colorado and play live someday. “Annie Get Yer Gun” is a bouncy little two-step with a big howling ending courtesy of Mr. Hancock, while “We Could Have the Lot” picks up the C&W baton and turns it decidedly campier, “I’ve heard of a such a debauch / Kings couldn’t afford to watch…. Say friend, say friend, what’s it gonna be? / Must we always sit back quietly / While others dance to violins? / We could, we could, we could have the lot / From the whiskey to the decadent / And just as well, a mademoiselle….” And yeah, the Coburn fuzz bass adds even further to the fun here. And McWilliams is having a hoot of a time on guitar here. 

       Anyway, “Countryclub and Love” is the second of the three Coburn tunes, and the most upbeat of the three. Once it gets past a slow woodwind-y intro, it kicks into an arrangement not entirely unlike what might occur if Doug Sahm had kicked Chris Stein the heck off his keyboard and assumed the musical helm of Blondie. (Yes, I do have quite the fun with these cross-genre-ational analogies – why do you ask?) And yes, more fun stomping bass to be had by all. I’m a sucker for that too, obviously.

       “I’m Ashamed” is about as cry-in-yr-beer as this album gets – “I’m ashamed / for having said these foolish things…” – but even this one does some more serious winking in the once-again-but-this-time-slowly-stomping chorus, “So talk -- to me / With your – body…” 

       “You From ’32,” the last Coburn tune, is by far the most fragile and Bazan-like of the bunch (except that Kurt knows what a falsetto is). And while not quite as touching as “Iris,” one sure can’t fault the lyrics for trying:

       Until my father passed away
       I’d spent all my years for naught
       And I’d never taken chances on a girl….
       Until my father passed away
       I couldn’t find the words to say
       Or share a single act of kindness
       Please God, forgive me for my blindness
       Oh, to think of my mistakes.
      
       And onto the big ending we go, and it’s BIG, even if it technically comes a song early. “The Empire Complete” starts like every great ‘70s ballad that sounds like a ‘50s ballad you’ve ever heard (and trust me, you’ve heard a lot more than you think you have). A quiet acoustic intro, punctuated only by some slightly off-beat McWilliams percussion, gives way to a string-laden bridge that explodes into a epic chorus that would’ve fit VERY comfortably on an early Bowie album (or at the very least, Steve Harley): “The walls fall around us / The empire complete / The buildings tall, the cars, the street / They’re crashing around you and me.” And some more great Hancock howling at the end. I still don’t know what the heck this song’s about -- heck, it might just be about some building that got knocked down, and Hancock thought it’d make a nice analogy for the “decadence” liberally seeded elsewhere throughout this album -- but listen to it and just try not to be affected.

       But in the spirit of “we take ourselves seriously – just not too seriously” that’s all over this album, our heroes instead choose to end with a Tex-Mex stomp that doesn’t even take two minutes to complete, but which is probably worth reprinting at length... well, just because....

       I didn’t get this dressed up
       Just to stand around the club
       I didn’t wear these shoes out
       Just to hold the carpet down….
      
       I may be wrong and impolite
       But you looked like you weren't having a good time
       Forgive me if I lead you astray, hey-hey-hey
       It’s just that you were depressing me
       I can’t go for that, you see
       I have faith in you
       In you
       In yooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo-ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo-oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooou…
       (BUM-BUM-BUM!)
      
       Buy this. Fund their trip to northern Colorado. Houston's a whole lot closer than Albany, you know (sorry, K-Hearts, just being practical). Make the dream real here, people.    

Posted by: burninglight at 21:40 | link | comments (47)