SOUL SURMISE

TOM PETTY - WILDFLOWERS & ALL THE REST

A few days into listening across the 4CD set that is Tom Petty’s remastered and reconfigured Wallflowers & All The Rest record and I am wondering if my favourite 3 Petty albums are right here in the one package! 

In 1988 I had heard rumours that Tom Petty was doing a side project without the Heartbreakers. I loved the Heartbreakers but I had this wee desire for a stripped back acoustic songwriter record. Much as I loved Full Moon Fever when it eventually appeared but it was different than I dreamed. 

As I listened to the All The Rest vinyl disc from Wallflowers & All The Rest I began to think that this was what I had wanted. Something Could Happen, Hope You Never and Hung Over and Overdue. It is not just Petty and an acoustic guitar but this is a raw honed songwriting that I don’t find anywhere in a Tom Petty catalogue that I love the vast majority of. 

There is something special about Wallflowers. I do love Full Moon Fever and actually when Jeff Lynne came back on board for Highway Companion I loved that too but Rick Rubin did something for Petty’s craft and muse. 

Apparently Rubin sent Petty away to listen to The Beatles Esher Sessions. These were the post Rishikesh songs that the band demoed at George Harrison’s house. As a result of their origins in India they were very acoustical based and that acoustic sound is all over the Wallflowers songs, particularly the ones that the band didn’t get as much time with.

Sometimes with artists with such longevity as Petty I find that some records found more traction than others, not because of the quality of the record but because of where my life or listening was just then. For me Long After Dark was somehow more a favourite than Wallflowers which is in retrospect Petty’s finest moment, even Petty himself agreed.

Whatever reasons had me not connecting with Wallflowers in 1994 (changing city, house, job) is all for my benefit now. Oh I knew the songs - You Don’t Know How It Feels, You Wreck Me, the title track - I just didn’t know the entire record. So, now I am discovering my favourite Tom Petty record 25 years later than I should have.

As if to help me do it, Petty’s daughter has gifted us all the original Wallflowers record with 10 tracks All The Rest that should have been on it and then another CD full of home recordings. After a listen to those Home Recordings I am actually thinking that the deluxe box set of Wallflowers now holds my favourite 3 Tom Petty records. 

These Home Recordings are not flimsy, half recorded sketches of songs we hear on the actual record. They are complete. They are of a high quality. That acoustic record I had longed for. Here it is. The harmonica on Only A Broken Heart and the piano on Wake Up Time remind me of Neil Young’s Harvest. Yet, the entire batch has its Beatles’ moments. Petty’s voice is totally committed and never so vulnerable. 

Then there is a live CD that brings it to Heartbreakers-ville. Oh yes, they all play on the actual Wallflowers record but when these guys took songs onto a stage they brought different incarnations, more jammed out, improvised, soul filled. 

My only annoyance is the delivery of this treasure trove. Double Cd. Triple LP. 4 CDs. 7 vinyl discs. 5 CD set. 9 vinyl discs and even an ultra deluxe version of the 9 vinyl.

This is the artist who is renowned and revered for challenging the price of an album back in the early 80s because he thought it might price fans out. Now he has his name to packages at $250 and $500. Come on.

Now, I know that Adria Petty has been meticulous in the packaging, which in every format is detailed and delicious, but as a big fan who has bought all Petty’s albums some on both CD and vinyl I would like all his stuff and I cannot justify paying $100 for one extra CD for the 5CDs. If I did spend that money I couldn’t support other artists by being able to but their work. It is time to rethink these deluxe editions. 

Having said all of that, this is as good as box sets get. I cannot get enough of it. I’ve waited 32 years for these records. They are utterly wonderful.

MARILYNNE ROBINSON - GILEAD

Since I discovered Gilead in the summer of 2009 its writer Marilynne Robinson seems to have been everywhere. That even includes Fitzroy where I got to greet welcome her to the book launch of my predecessor Rev Dr Ken Newell’s memoir Captured By A Vision.

Friends have published Doctorates, Masters thesis and other academic papers on her writing. She has become a strong voice in the public conversation of today’s fragmented and fractious America. She is intelligent and articulate. Even more exciting is that at the core of all she thinks, says and more importantly writes is a theological core.

Some might think that the story of a dynasty of minsters might fit too obviously into my reading schedule but quite the reverse.  I try to avoid anything that smacks of my job for my holiday reading. It is a holiday! 

For me to read about ministers in our Ballycastle hideaway, the writing would need to be something special!  Well Marilynne Robinson is something special.  When Bryan Appleyard’s back cover endorsement calls her “one of the greatest living novelists” he is not exaggerating. Pulitzer and Orange prizes (for Gilead and the follow up Home respectively) back up his assessment.  

Robinson writes with poetic prose that captures stunning images and with deep insight into the intricacies of the human psyche. More than that she goes to deep soul and asks her questions of love, forgiveness, loyalty, sin and redemption from a specifically Christian context, leaning at times on the Calvinistic; portraying all of that in its better hues!

The book is written in the form of a very, very long letter from an ageing minister to a very young son of a second late marriage, to a much younger woman, but ends up as the journaling of a tough relationship between the narrator Rev James Ames and Jack Boughton his best mate another minister’s son.  

In the midst of his wider life story and this more specific scenario you get a liberal sprinkling of spiritual nuggets that reveals that theological interest that I mentioned earlier.

At one point she writes, through old Rev. Ames, “This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.”  It is the attention that Robinson gives that planet that brings a new vitality, indeed transcendence to things that become too familiar, losing their sacredness. Robinson’s intrigue and fascination with the human being is obvious in everything she does

For me work did sneak in. Gilead elevated the familiar in our church liturgy and sacraments. She described baptism as “sacredness under my hand”. There's the preciousness of the human being again. 

Even more, the benediction. For too long that had become like the credits scrolling at the end of a movie. You didn’t even need to stay until the end. Many new churches have jettisoned it as a result. Ms Robinson gives it back all of its potency - “it was an honour to bless him.”  That privilege of blessing each other has become a vital part of our Sunday in Fitzroy. 

In the end the words, “Wherever you turn your eyes the world can shine like transfiguration.  You don’t have to bring a thing to it except a willingness to see,” sum it up.  Gilead refocused my eyes and strengthened the ardour of my willingness. It was a joy to read and its benefits go on.

BE GENTLE MY HEART (NOTE TO SELF IN COVID TIMES)

Be gentle my heart

Be tender

It’s mental my heart

Remember

There has never been days

Like these

So, please

Be gentle my heart, be tender.

 

Be defiant my soul

Be open

Be reliant my soul

Ever hopin’

That everybody is heading

To a place

Of grace

So be defiant my soul, be open.

 

Don’t lie

Or deny

It’s tough

Fix your eye

And rely

On love. 

TOMORROW IN FITZROY - 18.10.2020

Tomorrow in Fitzroy we are ONLY meeting on-line. The service will go live on YouTube at 11am.

I am very excited about Philippians 2. I am thinking it might just have become my favourite chapter in all of the Scripture. Robust theology. Christology in poetic form. Applied in everyday relationships. A pastors heart shaping the choice of theology and the application. I  suggest that Covid 19 might be for our spiritual fitness what sand dunes are to preseason soccer players.

In a week where we all seem to be at Tether's End we will look to see how we can see this theology of Jesus as the help for us to see each other through and become better disciples. An original poem and song as sonic aids.

TETHER’S END

We are at Tether’s End

Question upon question

Distanced too far apart

Too much isolation

We are at Tether’s End

Months of dismal headlines

People dying every day

Friends risking on the frontlines

 

We are at Tether’s End

Dizzy and out of control

Hurled against our will

Weary and fractured souls

 

At Tether’s End

We need tolerance and grace

Tenderness and compassion

A comforting embrace

At Tether’s End

We need a radical humility

Others always above ourselves

The Spirit of like minded unity.

 

We are at Tether’s End

Where do we get tested

Rules changing all the time

After all that we invested

We are at Tether’s End

When can we visit grandma

Is the baby counted in the bubble

And what’s wrong with the cinema

 

We are at Tether’s End

Exhausted from the fall

Fractious and pontificating

Like we know it all

 

At Tether’s End

We need tolerance and grace

Tenderness and compassion

A comforting embrace

At Tether’s End

We need a radical humility

Others always above ourselves

The Spirit of like minded unity.