On this American Independence Day... let me take you on a romantic journey across the country's vastness... celebrating its wonder... and prophetically critiquing its failings...
AMERICANA - RAY DAVIES
(from Americana)
LONE STAR - ROMANTICA
(from Shadowlands)
TUPELO - JASON ISBELL & THE 400 UNIT
(from The Nashville Sound)
TUSCON TRAIN - BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
(from Western Stars)
AMERICAN TUNE - SHAWN COLVIN
(from Uncovered)
INDIANA - CHRIS WILSON & THE HERESY
(from Downfall EP)
WELCOME HOME - OVER THE RHINE
(from a single))
CALIFORNIA - DREW HOLCOMB & THE NEIGHBOURS
(from Souvenir)
TIME SPENT IN LA - DAWES
(from Nothing Is Wrong)
LOS ANGELES - LUKE SITAL-SINGH
(from A Golden State)
GRACELAND - CHRIS MARTIN
(from BBC Radio 1’s Live Lounge 2017
NEW YORK MORNING - ELBOW
(The Take Off And Landing Of Everything)
MONA LISAS AND MAD HATTERS - THE KILLERS
(from Revamp; The Songs Of Elton John and Bernie Taupin)
SING ME A SONG - COWBOY JUNKIES
(from All That Reckoning)
AMERICAN SOUL - U2
(from Songs Of Experience)
LAND OF THE FREE - THE KILLERS
(single)
AMERiCAN LANDFILL - SAM PHILLIPS
(from World Of Sticks)
BIRMINGHAM SUNDAY - RHIANNON GIDDENS
(from Freedom Highway)
CHANGE - MAVIS STAPLES
(from We Get By)
GLORY (from The Motion Picture ‘Selma”) COMMON & JOHN LEGEND
When The Killers released Human, the lead off single of their third studio record Day and Age, it caused, more discussion about a pop song lyric than for many a long year. “Are we human or are we dancer” was so grammatically askew that it drew some to conclude that for “dancer” it actually should read “denser.” That most believed it to be “dancer” led to discussion list damnation. It seems ironic that perhaps the most provocative and deep lyric to have stuttered from a rock singer in years should be so maligned. In the debate about the grammar, it could be argued that poetic licence is all about such convenient shifts from plural to singular.
Anyone who knew anything about this thoughtful Las Vegas band from their previous albums, that have catapulted them onto the coat-tails of U2 and into the stratosphere of stadium-rock-with-meaning, should have known that if there was something out of kilter in singer and songwriter Brandon Flowers chorus it should be pondered a little longer; this serious young man with a Mormon world view must have had some reasoning going on.
"It's taken from a quote by [author Hunter S.] Thompson. ... 'We're raising a generation of dancers,' and I took it and ran,” Flowers would explain, “I guess it bothers people that it's not grammatically correct, but I think I'm allowed to do whatever I want. 'Denser'? I hadn't heard that one. I don't like 'denser.' " The obvious follow up question was whether Flowers agreed with Thompson’s assessment?
"I think that I do, and I don't want to be too much of a preacher," he said. "I say that it's a mild social statement, and that's all I'm gonna say. We're still trying to write the best pop songs we can write." It seems to be a similar strategy to the one Jesus took when he dropped spiritual explosives into the hearts as well as ears of his hearers. The explosive does not need spelling out; that might diminish its potency. “Those with ears to hear...”
No doubt Thompson meant a lot of things when he described a generation of dancers. What Flowers does is bring it back to one overriding need; to restore our humanity. The world has a long history of de-humanising. One of the most powerful means of healing is to re-humanise. To give people back their dignity; whether nations or individuals.
That Flowers declares that he is on his knees looking for an answer is sure to indicate that for him the answer to his question is in the human soul and its connection with the Divine. Racism, war, materialism, image and sadly many times religion has de-humanising effects. The Killers Human is a song of prophetic stimulus because it is attempting to re-humanise, those whose humanity has been stolen by a culture that de-humanizes.
This morning in Fitzroy we launched a single. Africa (Waving At You) by Jonny Fitch. It's a co write between myself and the very talented Jonny and is now available on Bandcamp!
I wrote the lyric on the 12 hour bus journey from Arua to Kampala on our first trip to Uganda in 2015. The waving was my way in, as on that journey every mile or two Ugandan children were waving at us, waving at them.
More serious is my prayer. It is basically that hope that, as Uganda and Africa develops, it doesn't get the bad habits of our wealth. Unaccountable wealth is over rated. Africans have riches in many more important things that I hope don't get squeezed out with decadence and greed.
The last lines might not be the best I have ever written but, when I shared them with my brothers and sisters in Onialeku Primary School at its opening in August 2015, they became my favourite!
Jonny has turned it into the catchiest of songs and added the "My name is not Muzungu" line. He has added that African sound of exuberance and the children you hear are the children of Onialeku Primary School in Arua, West Nile, Uganda.
All proceeds from the sale of the song go towards a new building for the Nursery School in Onialeku. Feel free to donate more than the pound you are asked for!
And well walk right through to our own way, our own place"
- from Take Me To The Place by Deacon Blue
I had an amazing experience using this song in a Day Of Reflection event in 2012. June 21st, the longest day is when Northern Ireland takes time to remember those who were injured or lost loved ones in the Troubles. Invited to be part of an event I reached for this amazing pastoral song by Deacon Blue. It was a b-side, not one of their best known songs.
After the event a woman asked to speak to me. She had lost her husband near the end of the Troubles. Loyalist paramilitaries walked into the printers that he was working in and shot him. He was not involved in The Troubles. He had been a Deacon Blue fan and on the way to the event we were at she had reached for a Deacon Blue CD as a way of remembering. When I played this she sensed that something beyond us was happening. It was moving for us both and a reminder to me how important music is in our healing.
Donald and Emily Saliers wrote a fascinating book together called A Song To Sing, A Life To Live. The fascination is that both of this father and daughter duo are musicians, Don a Professor of Theology and Music and Emily one half of the popular rock duo The Indigo Girls; thus bringing Saturday night and Sunday morning together in their ponderings. Sharing their own personal loss of Emily’s younger sister they write, “Music was one of our primary ways of coming to terms with her death.” I believe that one of the conduits for God’s comfort is lament.
The Bible is full of it - angry, frustrated, painful. Songs of lament do something deep in our souls. They can drill to the nerve centre of our pain, somehow empathise, soothe and mysteriously be companions as we journey through dark days. As a pastor I often give friends or parishioners a song or some music that will be a resource through their grief.
Deacon Blue’s song Take Me To The Place is the most perfect catharsis song I have ever heard. It was written in memory and dedicated to Italian Scottish photographer Oscar Mazaroli. Growing up in Church writer Ricky Ross has a real sensitivity for such scared places and spaces and based the song on the hymn Abide With Me and the traditional melody “eventide.” It’s stunning poignancy in Ricky’s yearning breaking voice, Lorraine Macintosh’s angelic wail, the sorrowful stark piano, the words and the tune, opens doors to the soul and let’s out the raw ripped up heart pain and let’s in some healing holy balm and the daring and courageous almost alien thought of hopefulness and grace.
I offer it as song to be used on every Day Of Reflection.
There was a Pentecost Sunday, back in the day. I was doing my radio show on BBC Radio Ulster and used the Holy Spirit as the obvious theme for the evening. Two songs in and I got a text from my friend Geoff predicting early that I would play Michelle Shocked’s version of this Victoria Williams’ song!
I had forgotten about it! How? As I scanned all my CDs I had somehow missed it. I immediately got on the phone and spoke to Tim, Janice’s cousin, who lived with us at the time. Telling Tim where to look in my thousands of CDs he found it, then drove it to the BBC where I was able to include it at the end of my one hour show.
It was worth the drama. It’s a great song. As songs go, it is the best expression of the energy and indeed joy that Pentecost conjures, the Holy Spirit being poured out on the heads of a motley crew of Jesus’ followers, chosen by Jesus himself to transform the entire world.
Michelle Shocked with its Gospel harmonies gives a Pentecostal Church feel to the song. Perfect. Thank you Geoff for the reminder!
Victoria Williams’ music was infused with the spiritual impact of Christian conversion. Williams is looking everywhere she goes and the song finds the Spirit on Lake Bistineau and in the New York City subway. In the former she is singing with friends around a campfire and in the latter receiving the generosity of a stranger.
In conclusion, Victoria makes her declaration that is perfect on this Pentecost Day:
“I have seen it on a mountaintop
I have felt it beneath stars
I have felt it in a churchyard and even in some bars
It will make you laugh, make you cry, make your heart go ping
Yeah the Spirit, Holy Spirit will make you shout and want to sing
So many of us are uneasy at the State Visit of US President Donald Trump to the UK. For my own catharsis, I have been listening to Karine Polwart’s brilliant spoken word piece I Burn But I Am Not Consumed, the title of which is also the motto of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland!
Karine Polwart’s record Laws of Gravity soared to the highest echelons of my Record of 2018. I was intoxicated by her voice and word play.
There is no better showcase for the power of her poetry than I Burn, But I Not Consumed. It is a protest song against the 45th President of the United States Of America, setting his narcissistic personality in the long, long history of the Isle of Lewis where is mother came from.
Polwart’s literary flair is more sensitive than her content:
Your mother was a wee girl once,
who played upon my rocky shore.
And you, you are broken boy,
and you want more and more and more.
You build a tower. You build a wall,
You live in fear that they might fall.
You who see nothing but your own face
in the sheen of The Hudson River.
Polwart sets Trump and all his Presidential pomp against the power of nature, history, the planet and maybe through the title, God.Polwart wonders how the marbled, metamorphic rock of Lewis,two-thirds the age of Earth and the waves that crash against it will judge the son of one of the island’s daughters.
It is gripping, provocative and brilliant.
A balancing is yet to come,
although by then you may be gone
and leave a desert to your sons and daughters.
Still, these waters, they will rise,
the North Sea haar will cover your eyes,
despite your appetite for lies.
and your disregard for truth.
Your unease at images of Trump in the UK might be eased with a few listens…
So, as we find our politicians getting around a table to talk, for the first time in too long, here is the song I wish could be piped on a loop through Stormont Buildings until they heard it, listened to it, caught the wisdom and cracked the code!
I have loved this song since I downloaded it in Uganda last summer. On a Dawes album that perhaps took longer to ingratiate this one was an immediate prophetic hit. I have waited for the day to blog it and today is the day!
Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith has spoken of the song:
“This song is about the effort keep a line of communication alive between people who don’t quite understand each other. Considering the current social and political climate right now, I’m sure there a lot of us that assume there’s a good number of tense family get togethers coming our way in one form or another. With lines like “I wanna sit with my enemies and say we should’ve done this sooner” or “forgive our shared mistakes,” this song is my dream version of how those evenings/exchanges could possibly go.”
Perfect then for a stand off that Dawes probably do not know much about. However, everything that could crack the code of the latest Irish inertia is found right here in this song:
A game we thought we had all outgrown, but still everybody plays
Oh aye
Ignoring all of the remedies, believing all of the rumors
With their endless database
For sure
I wanna sit with my enemies and say
We should have done this sooner
While I look them in the face
Maybe that would crack the case
Sooner? You think!
The second verse has a woman throwing out her unfaithful husband. Compassion kicks in. There are two crucial lines:
Punish him for the life he chose
But forgive the past that he did not
In our Northern Irish Troubles there are many things we chose. A lot of people though didn’t choose but got thrown into lives they would d have rather escaped.
At recent 4 Corners Festivals we have heard from the New Irish Arts, “Hatred is compromised by relationship” and from Fr Greg Boyle, “It is hard to demonise people that you know.” I think Dawes take it a step further here. It is not only knowing the enemy but empathising with what they have been through.
It's really hard to hate anyone
When you know what they've lived through
Then that character of God comes shining through. She will love him while he sorts out his crimes. That is a state of grace But that indeed cracks the case. Every case. Certainly it would help with our case!
And once they've given you a taste
She said
This is for you to overcome
But I will always love you
In her perfect state of grace
Maybe that would crack the case
There is more. After getting face to face, in a state of grace, we can go deeper:
Now that we're through with formalities
What is it you wanna ask of me?
I'll answer open and honestly
Whatever that means
Let’s look at our different stories of the past:
Findin' out that we occupy
Somebody else's opposin' side
On the banks of some great divide
Two versions of a dream
Countless revisions of history
Tryin' to tell us the future
Between each commercial break
And the dream… to see our complicity. To acknowledge that both have wronged the other. To share the mistakes and forgive.
I wanna call off the cavalry
Declare no winners or losers
And forgive our shared mistakes
You can pick the time and place
Maybe that would crack the case
It could have been written about our wee country. It speaks into its wounds and sins. Play it on a loop God, until it hypnotises them with truth and love nd peace a shared future! Until it cracks the code!
My mate Doug Gay pointed this one out to me. As well as a theologian, author and songwriter Doug is a liturgist and has always his eye on mainstream songs that might cross over into Church services. I then think that he reckons that Fitzroy are the most likely Church to play out his imaginings! We are more than happy to try.
I had missed Trusty and True. I guess I lost a little interest in Damien Rice because of his lack of output. I loved O, then spent less time on 9 and by the time of My Favourite Faded Fantasy I was lost. Hence it took a few years before Doug pointed this gem out to me. It was the YouTube version at the top of this blog.
It is stunningly beautiful and utterly spiritual. I obviously scoured the internet seeking out Rice’s spiritual credentials. I found quite a lewd story that, though threaded with wisdom, was not for congregational consumption. I also discovered Rice talking about the hold that his Catholic childhood had upon him and how though he has attempted to throw it off the need for confession and dealing with guilt isn’t just a religious thing.
The opening is almost like the apostle Paul’s “For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do” (Romans 7:15). It is about the propensity to yield to temptation and do what we know to be wrong. Christians would describe it as the mark of our fallen nature.
We've wanted to be trusty and true
But feathers fell from our wings
And we've wanted to be worthy of you
But weather rained on our dreams
And we can't take back
What is done, what is past
So fellas, lay down your fears
'Cause we can't take back
What is done, what is past
So let us start from here
There comes a time when we realise the damage our actions cause and our guilt needs a place to go. Again, the Christian sees this as the job of Jesus described by John The Baptist as “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”. For most practising Christians a sacrament brings us to the Lord’s Table where we eat the bread and drink the wine, as Jesus asked his disciples to do. This represents his body and blood. This is about the forgiveness of sin.
In Fitzroy, we used Trusty and True (thank you Dave Thompson with the help of Chris Blake and George Sproule) in one of these sacraments and it was beautiful lead in: -
My mate Doug pointed it out. I had Damien Rice’s album My Favourite Fantasy but the album had made such little impression that I had missed track 7, Trusty and True.
Doug showed me this Youtube link with the choir Dekoor Close Harmony. How deeply spiritual, it sounds. Almost liturgical.
I searched for a Damien Rice explanation. Was he thinking in any way of religious imagery? The only story I got was rather rude, yet there was wisdom in the lewdness. From the rude it turned on a seismic pin head to new starts and forgiveness. It’s almost for a Confessional.
It begins with our aim to be true that somehow never holds:
We've wanted to be trusty and true
But feathers fell from our wings
And we've wanted to be worthy of you
But weather rained on our dreams
It is almost what the apostle Paul wrote in Romans 7 - For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.
Rice goes on:
'Cause we never wanted to be lusty or lewd
Nor tethered to prudish strings
And we never wanted to be jealously tuned
Nor withered into ugly things
For the flawed human there is nothing for it but confession, forgiveness and a new beginning. That’s where Rice goes. Though we never know who we are coming to, we are invited to come…. and to come as we are: -
And if all that you are
Is not all you desire,
Then, come
Come, let yourself be wrong
Come, it's already begun
Come, come alone
Come with fear, come with love
Come however you are
Just come, come alone
Come with friends, come with foes
Come however you are
Just come, come alone
Come with me, then let go
Come however you are
Just come, come alone
Come so carefully closed
Come however you are
Just come
It is beautiful. Utterly beautiful. Welcoming. Forgiving. Grace filled.
Doug suggested using it as a communion piece. Fitzroy are always up for the challenge. Eventually we used it. Dave Thompson with some help from Chris Blake and George Sproule. We might add a choir soon. It was sung as the congregation came forward and gathered the cross to receive the bread and wine. It worked a treat!