I grew up in a Christian home; my father was a baptist minister, but also a lover of rock’n'roll, country and folk music. One of the things I always found confusing, yet interesting, was the difference (and parallels) between my fathers sermons and the lyrics of some of the music we had on in the home. He was a great fan of Bob Dylan, the Beatles, John Lennon and the Rolling Stones. So on Sunday mornings we’d sing Bind us together with cords that cannot be broken; yet mid week we’d hear “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction”, and “Imagine” (there’s no heaven). The message on Sundays was so strong – be in the world but not of the world; be transformed by the renewing of your minds, do not be yoked with unbelievers, yet the sounds I was hearing all apparently belonged to unbelievers (Bob Dylan’s “Saved” years notwithstanding). I struggled with the question for years – should I really be listening to music about lust, pain, beauty, searching, drugs, wonder, – music of the flesh, as it was referred to in church circles; should I be listening to the blues, hard rock, gangster rap, motown, soul.
Soul – there’s a word! The human soul was such a dangerous place to explore, as the devil could easily be found lurking there, prowling, waiting to pounce on anyone who became entranced by such worldly music. Worldly, secular, soulish, experiential, non-Christian music was so good, so tempting, surely the forbidden fruit. As the late Larry Norman put it – ‘why should the devil have all the good music, when Jesus is a’rockin’ and rollin’ my blues away!’. Perhaps that was the answer – find good wholesome Christian alternatives – Stryper, KingsX, Keith Green and latterly Delerious?. But none of these could slake my thirst for music with soul. It was like trying to drink wine from a bottle of Evian, trying to eat a nut roast while craving a chateaubriand. But the guilt I would feel after lengthy indulgence into the Led Zeppelin, Santana and Jimi Hendrix discographies would be almost unbearable. Almost. Perhaps the devil was getting a grip on my soul. Was I becoming un-saved? Was I backsliding? It felt so good. The wide road to destruction? As Bonn Scott from AC/DC put it “I’m on my way to the promised land – I’m on a highway to hell’
For me there was no getting away from the fact that music, and therefore the devil, had a hold on my life. It would move me in ways nothing else could, in ways even I completely failed to understand. I remember being 9 years old and being completely moved to tears when I heard Joan Baez sing the Prison Trilogy. It still has a similar effect on me now!
I hadn’t yet seen the inside of a cell, let alone be able to understand the desolation of someone incarcerated. Yet something about this song enabled me to guess as to the pain of the three men in the story. Something enabled me to share in this pain, and as an act of worship, I invite you to do the same. – look it up on Spotify
The depth of emotions explored through the music of the folk and country balladeer informed me a great deal about the human condition. Irish folk music was another particular favourite of my father; songs about potato famine, invasion, sectarian violence, people being hurt by the hands of those who were supposed to protect them, all etched a place deep in my soul. I had the privilege of touring Ireland with a pop band, and met folks in the various places we stayed. The most memorable being in Belfast during a ceasefire in 1995 when I had the opportunity at the after-show wind-down to ask one of the fans, a young girl about 20, whether the troubles had affected anyone she knew.
“everyone” was the answer
“even you?”
“my father and brothers were all shot in front of us, on a Sunday afternoon while we were forced to watch”
A Sunday, Bloody Sunday which the remainder of that family will carry for ever.
I think it was at that point that I started to realise that church and religion was not God.
It was also around that time when I first heard Jeff Buckley’s rendition of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah; and from that point on, the notion of a cold and broken hallelujah became a caption for my faith. In church we used to sing about fighting the good fight, moving onward as Christian soldiers, conquering nations, and such. When I heard that ‘Love is not a victory march, its a cold and its a broken hallelujah’, a light went on. Perhaps God wasn’t so much in the victory marches, the crusades, the moral high ground, the blessed, the prosperous, the songs of euphoric adulation, songs which set us up as a ‘chosen people, a royal priesthood’, and as ultimately elite. Go have a listen. Ignore the Alexandra Burke version at all costs. She missed the most important verse out, leaving the rendition lacking complete coherence.
No, it is my experience that God manifests most significantly in areas of pain, despair, wilderness. My early understanding of Christianity was that if someone was in pain, and if they were a Christian, then God would be near them, and somehow make the pain more bearable. However, those poor souls who were not Christians had to experience the pain without God; that somehow God was looking on and unable to do anything about their pain unless they uttered the magic words of the “sinner’s prayer”. I clearly had a lot of working out to do, and music was critical in enabling me to think all this through.
One particularly significant song which enabled me to see the trade mark of a God of creativity was in “Everybody Hurts” by REM
Surely if God was the creator, and if God’s very being, the raison d’etre was creativity then why should things which are created be attributed to the devil?
I was in a band. A rock band. With my mates. We wrote and played music in every spare minute we had. We wrote songs about things we loved, attitudes we hated, girls, boys, corruption, the monotony of the daily grind as we all drove our delivery vans around London. Our music became our church, and there we discovered an oasis, a place from which we could drink the water of life, and share it with others. It was our piece of heaven in a wilderness of a life we were all struggling to understand.
Have a listen
However, we were to sign a big publishing deal – something which would extend the invitation to the party at the oasis to a wider audience; but money started to become the topic of the day. It was a matter of weeks before the band folded, and its members cast back out into the wilderness of depression.
This was a great relief to the Christian folks I knew, who would repeatedly tell me that the band was obviously “not part of God’s plan”; that the depression I was suffering was a result of the sins of “nihilism” and “hedonism” I’d committed whilst being a member of a rock band. I needed to repent and be delivered, so I could be welcomed back to the fold. I had to renounce my association with other nihilists and hedonists, and was advised to rid my beloved record collection of anything with the satanic back beat, anything which belonged to Lucifer (which, it appeared, was most of it), and to concentrate all my efforts into evangelism and discipleship.
I tried. I really did. But depression got the better of me and eventually God and I parted company (at least this was my take on things). I told God that, even if he or she did exist, that I was no longer willing to be in a relationship. I effectively dumped God. I did not understand the idea of a God who, through the combination of the physics of sound, and the depth of human emotion, through poetry and the audio spectrum, would give us music, yet refuse us Christians, the privilege of experiencing it to the full.
So, there I was, free again! My record collection was no longer off-limits. Out came the Rock, the Rap, the Reggae, the drum’n'bass, the house, hard-house, trance, grime-core, grunge, punk, new romantic, electro, downbeat, lounge, jazz, blues, soul, funk, folk, be-bop, ballad, welsh male-voice, baroque, classical, romantic, modern, medieval, thrash metal, alternative, gothic, avant garde, Bhangra, dub, bossa nova, breakbeat, britpop, Cajun, calypso, Celtic, ambient, electronica, IDM, hiphop, techno, new age, northern soul, old skool, minimalism, prog rock, raggamuffin, samba, ska, skiffle, speed garage, two tone, etc, etc, etc, etc. I chose not to choose church. I chose something else. I chose music.
But then something happened.
I started to recognise God’s trade mark again. There was something about the creation and performance of music which seemed supernatural. There was something about the way that I connected with people through their music which transcended cultural identity, geographical location, religion, sexuality, ideology. It had to be God.
I was invited to attend a church service put on by a group of folks who were exploring life beyond charismatic evangelicalism. The service was called ‘The Abbey’, hosted by a group called “Resonance” (latterly “foundation”). The structure of Cotham Parish Church was divided into the various areas of a monastery, the dormitory, the infirmary, the sanctuary, the refectory, the library, and best of all, the scriptorium. We were invited to explore all these places and the special meanings they had, all set to a fabulous backdrop of music DJ’d by John Hoyland. This service was, for me, the turning point. It was in the scriptorium I meditated on creativity, and the nature of the connection between it and God. I started to realise that no matter who you are, where you’re from, whatever your beliefs and persuasions, that your creativity comes from God, as a gift to your soul, to provide a vehicle for expression, and sharing.
This enabled me to see God, in music everywhere. I discovered a new beauty in music.
Head back over to Spotify, and have a listen to Home by Zero7. This song, with its haunting melody and harmonies, is to me quite God-like in its attention to detail and aspirations to perfection. Particularly in the way the recording and production is crafted and realised.
Nowadays, whenever I hear songs of pain, of joy, of love, of hate, of sorrow, of fear, of suffering, of overcoming, of longing, of searching, of regret, of loss, of redemption, of jealousy, of beauty and of hope, I hear God. I hear God identifying with and sharing in these emotions, and I believe that because God is in music, then when we indulge in music, we indulge into an aspect of God.
Sure, there is music which seeks to exalt success, money, celebrity, possessions, promiscuity, racial division, racial supremacy, anarchy, bling, and a disrespect for law enforcement. Do I see God in music of this nature?
Of course!
I see God in the recording and production, in the musicianship, in the mixing and mastering, in the years of hard training and low-paid apprenticeships people have gone through in order to be able to make the records and to make the equipment needed to make the records,. The lyrical content may not necessarily be to my tastes, but then I have no experience of growing up with gun lore on the streets of Compton, California, or of being sold into child sex abuse by my parents, or of being beaten for the colour of my skin, or of absolute rejection, or indeed many of the myriad ways in which bad things can shape attitudes to the world. So, the likes of Eminem, Rage Against the Machine, Snoop Dogg, and various other Bad Bwoy styles all frequent my playlist, and often at SPLs approaching anti-social!
This freedom of expression is, to me, the greatest gift and any religious attempts at thwarting it is, in my opinion, sacrilege.
Now, go and listen to Stairway to Heaven, and light a candle for hope. BTW, the Dolly Parton version is, I reckon, by far the best cover of this track; check it out on Spotify.
