New music from a favourite artist

Being a big fan of music, I always get excited when one of my favourite bands or singers releases a new album. Sometimes it's a bit of a let-down (like Maximo Park's 'Quicken the Heart' from two years ago) but when the expectation is fulfilled, it's a beautiful thing. I remember hearing 'Don't Lose Yourself' by Laura Veirs for the first time, on the radio, just before her last-but-one album was released. Loved it instantly.

Well, this time I'm impatiently waiting for Patrick Wolf's new album. Mr Wolf is a funny one; he left home aged 16 or something, wears all sorts of crazy clothes and is just outrageously talented. He plays roughly 800 different instruments at last count. This album will be his fifth and, judging from the couple of songs I've heard, it's quite a big change of sound from his previous one. Mind you, that's pretty much par for the course with Patrick Wolf! His first album was very electronic, sample-driven; the second one (my favourite) full of acoustic folk, then on the third he went all shiny pop and his fourth album marked a shift back to the electronic, quite hard-edged and almost industrial in places sound of album number one. Here's a song from each one of his four albums, starting with Lycanthropy from 2003:









Patrick Wolf's not that well known so I won't be surprised if you haven't heard of him. I first became aware of him through reading an article on Drowned in Sound, a music review and discussion website. I've found out about quite a few artists through reading about them on Drowned in Sound and then checking out a few of their songs on the internet. Mind you, it's been at least a year since I discovered a new band – recommendations in the comments, please!

I am the Lord of the dance, said he

I wasn't brought up as a Christian so I missed out on lots of lovely Sunday School songs. We sang a few at my primary school, though, and I quite liked some of them. Had no idea what most of the lyrics were about, mind you. 'Open the door and let the fruit grow' – what on earth does that mean?

Anyway, I was recently reminded of one of those songs we sang at school that I really did like, even though I don't think I got what it was all about. I looked up the lyrics earlier and, just wow. They've hit me harder (in a good way!) than I've felt in quite a while. Check it out:

I danced in the morning when the world was begun
I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun
I came down from heaven and I danced on the earth
At Bethlehem I had my birth

Dance then, wherever you may be
I am the Lord of the dance, said he
And I'll lead you all wherever you may be
And I'll lead you all in the dance, said he

I danced for the scribe and the Pharisee
They would not dance, they wouldn't follow me
So I danced for the fishermen, James and John
They came with me and the dance went on

I danced on the Sabbath and I cured the lame
The holy people said it was a shame
They whipped and they stripped and they hung me high
Left me there on a cross to die

I danced on a Friday when the sky turned black
It's hard to dance with the devil on your back
They buried my body, they thought I'd gone
But I am the dance, and I still go on

They cut me down, but I leapt up high
I am the life that'll never never die
And I'll live in you if you'll live in me
I am the Lord of the dance, said he

I am loving the metaphor of life with Jesus being a dance. It works on so many levels; individual, family, community, right up to the cosmic. In fact, next time someone asks me, 'So, what's this Christianity lark all about?', I might just give them the words to Lord of the Dance.

The drive home

I was out today at a little family get-together where my uncles live in Hertfordshire. Everyone had a good time, I think, even though the draught Aspall's cider had run out. My parents both love the stuff!

What I really wanted to write about, though, was my drive home earlier this evening. I started with Radio Five Live, to catch up on the afternoon's football scores (go Saints! Go Liverpool!) and then put on one of my favourite albums, Year of Meteors by Laura Veirs. You can listen to samples of all the tracks at Amazon if you like, and here's a live performance of 'Where Gravity is Dead'.




I'd not listened to Year of Meteors for a few weeks and I think that made it sound somehow even better than usual this time! And the weather while I was driving down the M3 was just stunning; a spectacular combination of clouds, sun and rain, producing a beautiful rainbow behind me for several minutes. It was all strangely elating, like a glimpse of heaven. Almost perfect music to accompany an almost perfect visual scene.

In praise of Aimee Mann's album 'Whatever'

Aimee Mann is an American singer-songwriter who has been in the music business for well over 20 years but never really made it big, at least not in the UK. I guess she's best known for performing most of the songs from the film Magnolia, which was released in 2000 and starred Tom Cruise, Julianne Moore and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

It's Mann's first album that I want to tell you about, as it's one of my all-time favourites and I was reminded of this when I listened to it for the first time in a while the other day. 'Whatever' was released back in 1993 and you can listen to snippets of all the tracks at the US Amazon site.

The whole album is full of beautiful, heartfelt, clever songs but I thought I'd pick out a couple of personal highlights. '4th of July' is a painfully poignant tale of personal regret set against celebrations on Independence Day. I love the slightly unusual chords and Mann's voice is something from another world, so emotive and expressive. Here is a solo performance from a Jools Holland show a few years back. Just magical:



A couple of lyric lines from the song:

Today's the 4th of July, another June has gone by
And when they light up our town I just think, what a waste of gunpowder and sky

Another chapter in a book where the chapters are endless
And they're always the same
A verse, then a verse and refrain

And the song 'Say Anything' has some sharp, witty lyrics, along with another great instrumental arrangement. I can't find a video link (you can listen to 30 seconds at Amazon though) but here are some lyrics:

You see me as a judge though I deny it
And hold me like a grudge then justify it

So why do I refuse the truth
When I clearly cannot use
The comfort of one more lame excuse

Thinking back, 'Whatever' might have been the first time I took a punt on an album that I hardly knew anything about. I'd seen one song off the album just once on MTV and loved it so much that I went out and bought the CD. According to the review on Amazon UK the song, I Should've Known, had become a minor hit after being used on a TV programme. Anyhow, I'm so glad I spent my hard-earned pennies (or was it pocket money back then?!) on this album as it's still a favourite of mine after some 18 years. I hope you like it too.

I sold my soul to Jesus and since then I've had no fun

This is a lyric from from The Captain And The Hourglass by the wonderful Laura Marling. From what I gather, she was a practising Christian during some of her teen years but has since moved away from the faith. I'm guessing that the line from the song reflects, at least in part, her experience of Christianity. How sad is that? But I guess every Christian has felt that way from time to time, that it's all about a list of Dos and (more of these!) Don'ts.

Take, for example, the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7. This passage is often taken as a set of rules that Christians ought to follow; 'Do this. Don't do that.' But what if, instead, it was a description of how life will be for those living under God's power? Dallas Willard says in The Divine Conspiracy that Jesus' aim with the Sermon was to help his listeners understand 'the nature of the kingdom into which they are now invited'. Willard goes on:

'Far from being additional laws to crush us or show us we can't make it on our own (of course we can't!), the separate parts [of the Sermon] are distinct perspectives on the sweet life of love and power, of truth and grace, that those who count on Jesus can even now lead in his kingdom.'

Now doesn't that lift your spirit, rather than crushing it with a list of rules that nobody could ever dream of living up to?

More music that moves me

I posted back in July about some songs that I love, looking especially at the lyrics. Well, it's time for another post about music, I think.

It seems I'm on a constant quest to find Christian music I really like; so much Contemporary Christian Music is either droning heavy rock or cheesy MOR, at least to my ears. However, here's a Christian album of true beauty and spiritual insight: Kansas by Jennifer Knapp.

Firstly, I'm a big fan of melodic folk-rock and a sucker for a great voice. But more than that, Kansas is packed full of poignant, inspiring, piercing lyrics. Here are a couple of my favourite songs off the album with a little sample of the lyrics underneath.

Martyrs and Thieves (not great audio, sorry)



A great fool in my life I have been
Have squandered 'til pallid and thin
Hung my head in shame and refused to take blame
For the darkness I know I've let win

So turn on the light and reveal all the glory, I am not afraid
To bare all my weakness, knowing in meekness I have a kingdom to gain

Undo Me



Abba Father, you must wonder why
More times than Peter I have denied
Three nails and a cross to prove
I owe my life eternally to you

And finally, congratulations from me to Laura Marling and Arcade Fire, who both won awards at the Brits the other day! Two of my favourite acts getting serious recognition for the greatness of their music. Happy listening!

Musical genius

I’ve been listening to Picaresque (Amazon link) by The Decemberists this week. Fantastic album, full of great tunes, clever lyrics and interesting stories. I love how they write about such a range of subjects, from bereaved wives of American Civil War soldiers to teenage sporting disaster. Here’s a little sample of their lyrics:

When I was a girl how the hills of Oconee
Made a seam to hem me in
There at the fair when our eyes caught, careless
Got my heart right pierced by a pin

We are two mariners, our ship’s sole survivors
In this belly of a whale
Its ribs our ceiling beams, its guts our carpeting
I guess we have some time to kill
You may not remember me, I was a child of three
And you a lad of eighteen
But I remember you, and I will relate to you
How our histories interweave

Among five score pachyderm, each canopied and passengered
Sit the duke and the duchess’s luscious young girls
Within sight of the baroness, seething spite for this live largesse
By her side sits the baron, her barrenness barbs her
And we'll all come praise the Infanta

Trust me, I know they look really pretentious on screen but they work in the songs! If you like indie-folk-rock with a bit of prog and a guy with a slightly whiny voice…

While I’m on the subject of great lyrics, here’s a couple more that I just love, firstly from I Want You To Stay by Maximo Park:

I always said you could rely on me, now it seems that I was wrong
I want you to stay, I want you to stay with me
‘Cause nothing works round here where cranes collect the sky
I think of your face at night, ‘cause nothing works round here

It’s that line ‘where cranes collect the sky’ that gets me; what a perfect metaphor to describe a bleak urban, industrial landscape. Here’s another fab metaphor lyric, from my favourite American alt-folk singer, Laura Veirs and her song, Galaxies: (Unofficial video as the official one has got embedding disabled on YouTube)

When you sing, when you sing, stars fill up my eyes
Galaxies roll down my cheeks, galaxies
Galaxies, they flood the streets, galaxies

Hope you like some of these songs, and share your favourite lyrics below!