Nothing compares ...

Once again the old steam driven tower pc I persist in using won't let me cut and paste into a Facebook note so I am replying to one I was tagged in here.
It is the "Favourite Music for Worship" meme, following hot on the heels of a previous one about your least favourite chorus, which I declined to do (as it would have taken all day to decide which one of many cringeworthy things I have sung over the years would get that title).

So here are the questions
1.What is your favourite piece of music for congregational singing? Why?


2.What is your favourite piece of music for performance by a group of specialist musicians within a liturgical context? This might be a worship band or a cathedral choir or just a very snazzy organist or something else entirely, but the point is that it is not congregational singing and it is live music in liturgy.

3.What is your favourite piece of music which makes you think about God to listen to outside of your place of worship? Why? This could be secular music.

4.What is one thing you like about the music at your usual place of worship? Have you told the musicians about this lately?

And these are my answers. Reading this? You're tagged!
 
1. My favourite piece of music for congregational singing would have to be Keith & Melody Green's "There is a Redeemer". It was a close run thing between this and "Thine be the Glory", but I went for it in the end because it was sung at my ordination, and also because it was one o f the first songs I learnt following  my conversion in the mid 80's. The slight downside is that I usually end up thinking about Rory McGrath while singing it because he kind of looks like Keith Green...
 
2. I don't like the idea of performance in worship (justabout getting used to the concept of worship musicians having a "set list") but I am always very blessed by the worship team at St Mary's Church, Stebbing, when they play during the distribution at communion services. It doesn't really matter what they play!
 
3. The title of this post gives this one away. "Nothing Compares 2U by Prince (or more usually Sinead O'Connor). It's like a Psalm for me, a lament, though I know not all the lyrics really work. I'd love to do just the chorus in a Taize service one day.
 
4. See 2, and also, the organists in Lindsell and the Salings (who are both reading this via Facebook) never cease to bless me with their dedication and talent and desire to diversify.

facebook tag: 20 most influential albums

this'll be interesting.
I was tagged over on Facebook (like you need me to do a link) to list 20 albums (with reference to vinyl which shows my age) which have had a big influence on me. This post is the response but I'm afraid if you've never heard these you're going to have to google or spotify them yourself.
1. Pete Seeger's Greatest Hits. My dad bought this in the late 50's/early 60's when he hitchiked across the USA. He used to play it to us kids when we were tiny, and I can probably sing most of the songs on it now.
2. Electric Light Orchestra "Out of the Blue" I never owned this on vinyl, but probably taped it off a mate (Charlie, was it you?) Got the CD off eBay last year, and hey presto, all the lyrics came flooding back.
3. AC/DC "Back in Black" Got into this on a French exchange to Grenoble in 1981. Still some of the greatest riffs ever, but the lyrics make me wince in some cases. It is a kind of ambition to use the title track as the recessional music for a licensing in the future!
4. "Heaven and Hell" by Black Sabbath. Bought this off Martin Finey when I was 15. I was never an Ozzy fan really. Again, great riffs and many lyrics that make me shudder now.
5. Michael Jackson "Thriller". Just when it looked as if I was descending into permanent denim/leather/spots/long hair territory, along came MJ with this. I can still remember hearing the guitar solo in "Beat it" (played by Eddie Van Halen) and thinking, maybe there is more to music than rock and roll!
6. Dire Straits "Making Movies". Soundtrack to an anguished adolescence!
7. Telephone "Un autre Monde" Why should the Anglophones have all the good music? It helps that this was the only cassette I carried with me through my year off living in France.
8. Billy Bragg "Life's a riot with Spy vs Spy". Genius.
9. The Wedding Present "George Best" Best live band ever.
10. Half man half Biscuit "Back in the DHSS" Funniest ...
11. The Housemartins "London 0 Hull 4" - all these three mark a new departure in guitar based but "alternative" (whatever that meant) music.
12 REM "No. 5 Document" suede coatrs and sailors caps everyone!
13. U2 "The Joshua Tree" I could pick any of their albums up to the present but this one (and maybe Achtung baby) came out at times when what I really needed to hear was a soaring anthem mixing bitterness and joy, which is what they give you.
14 Guns and Roses "Appetite for Destruction" full circle ...
15. The Rolling Stones "Exile on Main Street" Pure and dirty at the same time. I bought this to prepare for their 1990 tour - still the only time I've ever been to Wembley Stadium.
16. The Indigo Girls debut. Postmodern Angst at its finest
17. Neil Young "Weld" Noise and politics can mix, especially on his version of "the times they are a changing" and "Keep on rocking in the free world". 
18.Enya "Watermark" Honeynoon. 'nuff said
19. Dido "No Angel"
20 Crowded House "Recurring Dream"  These are both influential because they are music i enjoy with my wife

Pretty sure that shows that not much music has touched me for about 15 or 20 years; hmmm

Good Friday walk 2010

A much smaller body of pilgrims this year (due to adverse weather) began the day at St James Great Saling with refreshingly original reflections on the arrest of of Jesus and Peter's denial, before moving off to St Peter and St Paul Little (Bardfield) Saling for some excellent readings, reflections and poetry (by Carol Anne Duffy) imaginatively bringing to life the relationship between Christ and Pilate's wife, and Pontius Pilate himself.

Then, with some additional late risers we set out for St Mary's Stebbing, where there was a break for lunch and some liquid worship involving handprints in sand, a reminder of our baptism in to Christ's death, and some opportunities to lay our burdens at the foot of the cross. This was most effectively achieved by the placing of stones (picked up on the way or gleaned at the last minute from the churchyard) in a cairn befroe the cross, which we did in silence listening to "Jesus Remember me".

The highlight of that service though was an av presentation using images and music to express the need for salvation for the world, and the wonder of God's gift of the cross.
I wish I could share it with you but there are myriad copyright issues!
Instead you'll have to imagine it; you are looking at pictures of human suffering, war, terrorism and sin, listening to this. Then the images change to those of the passion and crucufixion of Jesus, and hte music changes to this.  I mean it was my idea, but it still reduced me to tears. I am very gratful to our av guru Richard for his hard work.

After that we set off in deteriorating weather conditions towards St Mary's Lindsell, where after rain and sleet and wind, we hled a service of an hour at the cross with more inventive and original reflections on the death of Christ.

Afterwards there were hot cross buns and hot drinks, most welcome!

Cheer up, it's Friday

"If you don't like this song, there's something wrong with you, fact. Fact" - Chris Moyles, Radio 1, 26/3/10, 9:53am

So she woke up

There'll be a few bleary eyed clerics on Sunday morning, with the news that a U2 gig will be streamed live on Sunday at 3.30am UK time

Graceless lady? I think not.

I don't normally go for Stones covers, but this just blew me away

There are two sides to every story

because of this, about the Sun only wanting to back winners (allegedly), it's time we heard this again

That's going to be nearly 30 years old by next May. Strange how so much still resonates today (except of course it's lottery and t**s rather than bingo).

You've come a long way, baby

From this


To this


Not bad for a few months' work Fabio.

You have all been beautiful [I wish...]

There are some things that wind me up, like this.
There are other things that encourage me, like this.
There are some things that just confuse me, and then there is Rock and Roll .

Glastonbury special SAB

Have you ever seen Jimmy Greaves and David Crosby in the same room at the same time? Could it be that Greavsie's form dipped in the late 60's because he was using up so much energy touring with CSN&Y?

They're out to get you, better leave while you can

There were 65,500,000 hits on google for Michael Jackson this morning. The entire Internet will soon be overloaded with stuff about his death. It is literally unbelievable, but we said that about Elvis, Lennon, Kurt, Freddie, Bon, the list goes on. I'm sure there will be conspiracy theories hatching even now. It's just a shame that this will distract us from Iran, Afghanistan, Darfur, etc. One death gets lots of attention, other go unnoticed.

I'm not normally one to take celebrity death to heart, and was going to do an "EJ Thribb" for Farah Fawcett today. However, Michael Jackson was such an icon, and he did have quite an influence on me in the early 80's.

I was 16 the year "Thriller" came out. I didn't buy it, but I didn't have to - everywhere you went, every radio station, every TV music show, every disco for most of the 80's would play something by Michael Jackson. At that time I really only listened to rock music played by blokes with long hair wearing denim and leather, and I listened to it very loud. Dance music was not in my repertoire, and I wasn't alone. There were many youth club or school disco's (apostrophe for abbreviation, Lynn Truss fans) at which the girls all danced to one type of music, the boys to another (well, danced is a bit of an exaggeration).
then This happened:



"Beat it" provided dance music for the girls, and rock guitar for the boys. Ironically I guess Michael Jackson is almost solely responsible therefore for my discovery of the opposite sex.

"Thriller" also opened my mind to a much wider variety of music, which enriched my social life no end. It should be an interesting Glastonbury for cover versions.

I was a youth worker in the early 90's when the allegations of inappropriate behaviour against him started, and it was weird to be responding to young people's prayer requests - please pray for Michael Jackson ...

Moving seamlessly from nostalgia to cynicism, like Princess Diana before him, there will now be a sustained period of hysteria, conjecture and then eventually exploitation of the brand name. Poor bloke. At least the suicide rate will dip.

If I shed a tear it is more for my own youth that is past, than for the death of a talented but flawed musician. I should think his funeral will knock Diana's into a cocked hat.

My top 5 Michael Jackson Songs?

Beat it - see above

ABC

I want you back - what a bassline

Earth Song even if only because of Jarvis Cocker's moon

Don't stop til you get enough - almost the title of this post.

BGT/North Korea goes nuclear SAB

Susan Boyle Kim Jong Il

And the meek shall inherit the earth ...

This is a long post so only watch the videos if you have 20 odd minutes to spare (and like 1970's Rock music). If you're in a hurry just read the lyrics. If you are already familiar with 2112 by Rush, please proceed directly to the next paragraph.

OK, so this is a reflection on the current economic circumstances we find ourselves in. I just like the theme of the underdog, the little guy with the right answer, and can't help thinking, with a bit of help from Let us Be Human, that the values of the Kingdom of God are like unto the guitar found by the man in the story/song.

In spite of the opening line, I don't think this is the intended meaning of the song, it just appeals to me as a metaphor for those who are trying to say (and live a life that says) "Enough growth already!"

There was a quotation in the paper the other day - can't find reference aargh - along the lines of "if stimulating the economy means lending people money they don't want to borrow to buy things they neither want nor need, then what's the point?"

I once preached on 2112 on Maundy Thursday, reflecting that "We have assumed control, we have assumed control" is what appears to be happening when Jesus is arrested tried and crucified. 2112 ends with the Priests being ousted and replaced by an alien culture, with the anonymous protester in despair. Of course, through Good Friday and Holy Saturday, that's where we are, until the resurrection changes everything.

I'm mixing metaphors a bit really. There's just a big niggle in my gut that the G20, the politicians/economists who are saying "we've got it covered" are like the Priests of the Temple. Both insist their way is the only way to do it, and reject any attempt to do something more human, more beautiful, more just or more ecological. 2112 ends with a hostile takeover of a whole system.

If we don't do something to stop the juggernaut of greed, is that where we'll end up?

I'm more into music than economics, so you can probably pick holes in this, but that's what it's here for.

Offer me solutions, offer me alternatives and I decline

I started to watch this film late last night; couldn't stay awake but wish I'd recorded it. Idiocracy is a bit like Wall-E except with people not robots - it also has mountains of rubbish and green plants in the denoument. If I'd watched the whole thing I might have been better prepared for "Let us be human" week 2, which was very stimulating stuff. Thanks Sam!

Actually, check out these REM lyrics from 1985 and feel that shiver down your spine (unless they've been reading the same stuff ...)

Bankers will be Bankers

Famines will be famines, banquets will be banquets
Some spend winter in a palace, some spend it in blankets
Don't wag your fingers at them and turn to walk away
Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today
Time to end the praying
Listen what they're saying

Get up off your knees
You can wag your finger till your fingers sore
Shake your head till it shakes no more

Paupers will be paupers, bankers will be bankers
Some own pennies in a jar, some own oil tankers
What may sound like tomorrow could be ours today
There's no more need for sorrow if we get off our knees to pray

Time to end the praying
Listen what they're saying

Get up off your knees
You can wag your finger till your fingers sore
Shake your head till it shakes no more

Countries will be countries, borders will be borders
Some have lost their folks at war, some have give orders
Don't wag your fingers at them and turn to walk away
Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today

Time to end the praying
Listen what they're saying

that's 23 years old, that song. Copyright GoDiscs 1986. I looked it up after reading Phil's post from yesterday. Just got the CD off eBay for a quid.

Still says a lot to the G20 lot though, let alone the Church.(As does most of the album if you are so inclined)

You wouldn't get away with sleeve notes like theirs these days either (LTRU)

Orange slices and that Fall LP

Well, it was like finding a lost treasure in the attic.

Something you'd always known was there but had let the dust settle on it for so long that it kind of just blends into the background and becomes indistinguishable from all the other memories.

What am I on about? Its my affection for "The Wedding Present", a late 80's early 90's "indie" band who made a lot of noise coming out of my car stereo at ear bleeding volume in those days.

I lived in York when they first came to the attention of John Peel (pbuh) and they were a staple on the student union circuit - I think I saw them at Leeds Poly, Leeds University and Hull University. If you meet me and I can't quite hear what you are saying it is probably because of those gigs!

The best way of sharing this with you is to show you this


Nevermind the visuals, turn it up and feel the volume of "Take Me". It does have some lyrics at the beginning, which are typical angst ridden boy girl bitter sweet stuff, but I just loved and have rediscovered a love of that wall of noise (even if it does turn into Status Quo for a few bars). I just got 2 of their CD's , George Best and Bizarro off eBay (being permanently behind everyone else I am buying up CD's while the world goes digital!) and have been subjecting the children to them ever since!

Makes me want to compile a list of my favourite songs that are more than 9 minutes long, so that'll be along in a while. Better say they'll be from after 1980 otherwise I'll look even sadder than I already do!

Lord they give me all so much, they pick me up when I'm feeling blue now how 'bout you

Well that was a bit of a roller coaster week. It must be busy if all I have time to do is write comments on other people's blogs.

Tomorrow we have the diocesan Bishop coming for a confirmation, at which originally there were to have been 5 candidates doing different things - renewing vows, being received into the church and actually getting confirmed. After a week when (to re-use a phrase I coined earlier) everything has gone not just pear shaped but avocado pear shaped - heavy stuff with a big lump in - 4 candidates have dropped out; I did wonder about calling it off but the remaining person is actually quite ill and is going into hospital on Sunday afternoon, so the timing seemed right.

Also this week we have had some trees pollarded in the churchyard, bringing forth howls of anguish from people who (a) don't read or understand faculty notices and/or (b) think they know more about trees than our tree surgeon and tree warden combined. So the wardens and I have been fielding this "LOI" (land-owner issue) when really I wanted to get on with other stuff like booking New Wine (LSE) and gearing up for the ECHT Hosanna 09 conference at Chelmsford Cathedral.

Stuff for the Lent course arrived this week also after what seems like about a year in the post and "D'oh", I had mis-ordered so there won't be enough resources to go round the groups, giving me another headache for next week ...

So I was ready to let my hair down (if I had any outside my ears and nostrils that was long enough to let down) by Friday night, which was the school PTA 70's/80's disco. It was just for the parents too which meant that I could actually have a dance. You see, I suffer from (or maybe I should say profit from) a condition called "dads don't dance" which prevents me from being able to strut any kind of stuff let alone the funky variety in the presence of my children (or even other people's children come to that).

However, the hiring of a Travolta Saturday Night Fever suit led to an extremely enjoyable evening, very much in the style of the school disco's [yes there should be an apostrophe, for abbreviation] we all knew and loved, except that there was no-one being sick outside, and we could complement each other on dance ability or style without fearing being accused of chatting each other up. It was a cracking night and will I'm sure feature again in the PTA calendar and this blog (maybe even with photos next time!)

am also currently brewing a post about Jade Goody

Father and Son (or, why the subculture is pants)

Before we listened to the Obama stuff on the radio yesterday in the car, I was talking to my son about guitar music. He is learning the guitar and is not very motivated to practise, but he likes the electric guitar that is played in church. I thought therefore that I would play him some electric guitar music on the car CD, and talk about it. So I put on "Back in Black", by AC/DC which is hardly the most edifying spiritual material (e.g. "If God's on the left then I'm sticking to the right" from "Hells Bells", mind you at least they get God's politics right and acknowledge his existence!).



It does however contain some excellent riffs, and good examples of the interaction between lead and rhythm guitars, which we in due time talked about, using largely non-expert terms as I am not musical but like to listen to loud guitars and have done for some several decades now.



Then last night as I watched their gymnastics I was reflecting that a lot of the kind of music that I enjoyed as a young man wouldn't be very appropriate for the vicarage stereo today, as much of the sexism, phallocentricism and anti-God stance of (say) 1970's and 80's heavy metal goes against what I believe in when it comes both to human relationships and to God, yet here I was playing it to my son., because I wanted him to have the chance to hear it, and the thought came to me that the same thing happened to me when I was a kid.



My dad was a successful business lawyer, very involved in the Thatcherite boom, very into capitalism etc, yet when I was a kid I was raised on records by Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Leadbelly etc which was what he listened to as a young man, even though much of the message of that music went against where he stood then (and stands now.)



I didn't go to church at all until I was 20; my musical tastes were informed by secular music entirely. I had no idea at 20 that there was a whole subculture of music and art that agreed that the devil shouldn't have all the good music, and proceeded to make Christian versions that were morally and spiritually uplifting but still had the same riffs etc. Without wishing to disparage the musical integrity of these people, it has always struck me that this is an unnecessarily cheesy and isolationist approach to the relationship between music and spirituality.



The riffs of secular rock music in themselves are not satanic, but are the result of gifts and talents that I would say are God-given (even if to the producer rather than the musicians). When it comes to the lyrics I can only say that I'm glad I grew up on vinyl and cassettes, which made the words harder to work out, especially at high volume! So yes there is some stuff that I would switch off (or skip on the CD - had a mini epiphany yesterday in the car - "O blimey, that's about oral sex!" (a pint for the first person to guess correctly which song I was listening to!)) But why is it we have a tendency in the church to say that musical ability is only a God given gift if it is used to glorify God?

And why should I buy a CD just because it is by a Christian group when I prefer the music of the secular originators ? (being careful not to mention any names so as not to offend!)

The subculture is a con. Some people I have known use Christian versions of lots of things from holidays to plumbers to window cleaners (my window cleaner happens to be a jehovah's witness but I didn't employ him on that basis!) Its a con because it tricks us into ivory tower mentality - living in a safe world where only nice things and friendly godly people are around us. This effectively disables our mission by preventing us from ever actually meeting anyone who isn't a believer.

My kids live in a vicarage (some of their less enlightened school friends think they live in the church) but I want to make sure that they are free to experience as much as they can of modern culture and music. And if I have created the next Lemmy Kilminster then so be it.

It belongs to them ...

Heard this song on the radio today and remembered how evocative it was of the campaigns in the 80's to return land to aboriginal peoples in Australia. ThenI started wondering how it would be if Israel collectively had this on their ipod.

The Palestinians have been given land by international accord, yet Israel seems able somehow to decide for itself what is their land, rather as the Whites did generally in the New World in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Imagine (and pray for) Israelis singing "The time has come ... It belongs to them, let's give it back" [then perhaps they'll leave off bombing us]

That bald bloke in the video is now the minister for environment in Australia. Wonder if He will give it back?

99% of Gargoyles look like Bob Todd

As Mike Yarwood used to say, "And this is me ..."
This is the kind of thing that makes me glad to be Church of England. I thought it was just me who remembered stuff like :-

"If you ever wondered how you get triangles from a cow, you need butter milk and cheese and an equilateral chainsaw"!

And today's alpha awayday makes me glad and privileged to be a minister in God's Church!