Help of the Helpless

What keeps me coming back to the record store is the idea that inside each neatly wrapped disc or piece of vinyl might be some little secret that you'd never heard before. That secret might say any kind of truth, any kind of blurring of the truth, a flat out lie or any tall tale that might illuminate the world you live in. It might tell you something about a world somebody else lives in or a world that is to come. You either connect with a song or you don't, & even if you don't connect with it, it can still have a good beat with some nice harmonies. When you do connect with a song, it becomes a part of you, changes the way you see things. It reveals something new to you almost every time you hear it.

A good song is like a well pitched baseball game, you have to be paying close attention to the subtleties & nuances of the game, or it will be boring to you. It's also like a marriage, a performer can be giving it his or her all but if the listener isn't giving it their all the two of them might as well quit each other. A good song has many layers, it might mean something to one listener & something completely different to another. The way a lyrical phrase is turned can affect the meaning, making it completely different from the meaning on the page. Sometimes the meaning of a song is subtle, the performer wants you to draw your own conclusions, other times a performer can be beating you over the head with the meaning.

One song that's been finding me since I was a little kid is the hymn "Abide with Me". I have several recordings of this song (check out Ella Fitzgerald's version) although none quite sound like they did during evening church services sitting next to my mother when I was a kid. A version I've been listening to a lot lately is by Matthew Perryman Jones.



A simple definition of the word "abide" would be to stay with someone or something, but it means a whole lot more than that. To stay with someone can be rather passive, someone can stay with someone else for a lack of a better place to go. To abide, though, requires a persistence to remain with someone or something, even though the conventional wisdom is to leave. To abide with someone is not a pleasant experience. Think of two people holding on to each other while falling from an airplane. It's easier to let go than it is to hold on. What a perfect metaphor, God holding on to somebody that most people would say isn't worth holding on to when it would be easier for Him to let go.

Consider the lyric, "I need Thy presence every passing hour". The way my brain works when I hear this line is I think of a really hard time that I made it through, when I may have prayed for help. This is exactly the opposite of the truth that this song gets to. The inference I make when I think this way is that all the other hours I made it on my own. Every passing hour doesn't mean when I think I need "Thy presence" the most, it means every passing hour, regardless of how easy or hard, jubilant or depressing, exciting or mundane that hour may be.

This leads to the center of the song. A great song for me always has a center, one singular line that the rest of the song hinges upon. The rest of the lyrics are the background & the d'enouement. You have to have a problem if you need a solution, & the problem in this song is the line "thou hast not left me, though I've oft left thee". The reason I say this song has been finding me since I was a little kid, is that I don't think I choose to listen to it because it's got a good beat & some nice harmonies. It's not even up to me when I hear it. I used to think "though I've oft left thee" meant that there were times in my life in the past when I've strayed from God. When I hear it now, I realize that every day I stray from God, & every day he doesn't leave me. Every day He abides, makes a conscious effort to stay by my side, even when I give Him no reason to.

Five Favorite Songs of the Day

Abide With Me-Matthew Perryman Jones

Helpless-Neil Young with The Band



Go Folks Go-Bonnie "Prince" Billy & the Cairo Gang



Up on a Mountain-The Welcome Wagon



Lord I'm Discouraged-Charley Patton



Happy Sunday, friends...

andrew

The Back is Soft but the Seat is Hard, Why Can't They Get it Right?

I haven't been to our church in a few weeks as a result of Christmas parties & work. What I like about our church is that I always leave with a clear understanding of what it takes to be a Christian.

Last summer on a Saturday I was at a party, & I was talking to some people who I didn't know very well, & everyone was talking about what they were doing the next day. They asked me what I was doing & I told them I was going to church & whatever else I was doing. This lady, most likely in her late thirties with a couple of kids, said something to the effect that if she ever stepped in church the place would probably burn down. I missed a good opportunity to witness to her, mostly because I always feel like some sort of salesman. I don't like it when people try to sell me something, so why would anyone want me to sell them something. That's a subject for another day.

If I were to take a poll of people who claim to be Christians about why they don't go to church, I think the majority of people would fall into two categories, or a combination both.

The most common reason would be apathy. I think most people who don't go to church are in a habit of not going to church, & we humans have a hard time of breaking habits, especially when we don't have a compelling reason to do so. We may not think we can come up with a compelling reason, but the answer to this problem can be found in Isaiah 6:8, or in one of my favorite hymns, "Here I Am, Oh Lord, Send Me." "If you cannot speak like angels, if you cannot preach like Paul, you can tell the love of Jesus, you can say He died for us all."

The second reason is the same reason that most likely kept the lady at the party from going to church. Many people feel they don't belong at church, that church is for the high & mighty, the people who have it all together. This couldn't be farther from the truth. I like to imagine how much different church would look if it were filled with prostitutes, drug addicts, drunks, thieves & murderers. Would these people be embraced during that always awkward time of greeting at the beginning of the service, or would most people stick their nose up at them & look the other way? I know what my first inclination would be. But consider how much more powerful the message of Jesus' forgiveness would be to people who walk into church thinking they don't belong there but are welcomed once they are there.

Us regular church attenders, whether we are willing to admit it or not, think we have it all together because we are there at church every Sunday. Our sins are no less sinful than the prostitute or the murderer in God's eyes. The two biggest blocks to salvation are the thoughts that I don't need Jesus Christ because I'm such a good person or thinking that Jesus Christ can't & won't forgive someone like me. Which thought is easier to get rid of? Either we have to get our hyper-inflated egos out of the way and/or we need to get the weight of our sins off our shoulders. The good news is that Jesus took care of both of them on the cross, all we need to do is accept it.

Five Favorite Songs of the Day

Late for Church-The Drive By Truckers "All that hollerin' makes me wonder, does a whispered prayer get heard?"



The Wild Hunt-The Tallest Man on Earth



Here I Am, Oh Lord, Send Me-Mississippi John Hurt

Watch Me Fall-Uncle Tupelo

Wall of Death-Richard Thompson



Happy Sunday, friends, no matter what you're doing...

andrew

Save all of your light for those who can't sleep at night.

Every year I tell myself I'm not going to watch the ball drop. This year I thought I wasn't going to even stay up until midnight, but we had some friends over & we were having a good time so I did. If there's one thing that makes me sad is watching all of those people in the cold in Times Square & wondering if they are getting what they want out of life. I don't know that they'll find it wearing one of those hats and the glasses that say the year. Then there's poor old Dick Clark who gets trotted out there like a robot every year, all made up to look like he's perpetually 50 years old, all to hold on to some preconceived notion of what New Year's Eve should look like. The wee hours of the morning make me sad, too. I'd much rather get up at 3 in the morning than stay up until 3. It just feels unnatural, I think God made the day the way he did for a reason. There's enough darkness in the world, why make it any darker by sleeping through the best hours of the day?

I tell you what doesn't make me sad, though, is spending 2011 with the best little family I can imagine. A toast to Christie, Lillian & little Winston doggie. Lillian even gave us a couple smiles this morning, it's going to be a good year.








Five favorite songs of the day

Souvenirs-John Prine



I'm New Here-Gil Scott Herron



Empty Hearts-Josh Ritter



Compared to What?-John Legend & the Roots



This Year-The Mountain Goats



Happy 2011, friends...

andrew

I'm "that guy" with the camera that has to take a picture of everything.

Five Favorite Songs of the Day

Crepuscule with Nellie-Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane, At Carnegie Hall

My Favorite Things-John Coltrane

I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing-Sufjan Stevens

Keep Eye on Other's Gain-Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Lie Down in the Light

A Little Bit of You-Laura Cantrell, Not the Trembling Kind

andrew

I've learned only a few things in my first week as a pappy. First of all, babies aren't like the rest of us. Most of us don't know what we want. We have so much stuff, so many ways to be entertained, so many different things to eat or drink, so many people to interact with to be strengthened or to be discouraged by, that with all of these things flying around in our head we can't seem to pinpoint what it is that we really want. Lillian's different. She only wants to be held, to be warm, to be fed & to not have gas. I'm not sure she even cares if she has a dirty diaper or not.

I've learned I'm not a very patient person at 3:00 in the morning. I want to hurry up, change the diaper, feed her, burp her & for her to be back to sleep in twenty minutes. I've come to learn it doesn't really work that way. I think Lillian can probably sense this frustration, so the problem becomes worse. I'm learning, though.

Christie is quite a bit better at sensing what Lillian needs than I am, thankfully. A couple weeks ago, if you would have told me that Christie would be up with me at 6:30 in the morning smiling contentedly & telling me how happy she is I would call you crazy. Motherhood suits her perfectly. She only gets about half the amount of sleep she used to, but she is okay with it. She knows how to take care of everything Lillian needs, & she enjoys it. She is patient, kind, gentle & I couldn't ask for a better mother for my daughter.

Five Favorite Songs of the Day

This Side of the Blue-Joanna Newsom, The Milk Eyed Mendor

Tangled Up in Blue-Bob Dylan, Detroit 2006

Whatever Gets You Through the Night-John Lennon

Hello in There-John Prine, Souvenirs

Naked As We Came-Iron & Wine, Our Endless Numbered Days



Happy Sunday, friends.

andrew

I will want for nothing more

It's Saturday morning, & it's most likely our last weekend without the sound of a little girl in the house. I'm extremely excited about that. My usual Saturday morning routine when I don't have to work involves getting up around 6:30, taking a shower, letting the dog out, making coffee & then basically doing nothing productive until Christie gets up. I'll read the news on the internet, music reviews, blogs, I'll listen to tunes. I've come to cherish this little time of mine, & I guess I won't have it any more. I'm okay with that, I'm 31, it's time for a change. That little girl of mine will be more exciting than anything on the internet, anyways. I hope she doesn't mind listening to jazz in the morning, until she discovers cartoons.

Five Favorite Songs of the Day

Say It (Over & Over Again)-John Coltrane, Ballads

Workingman's Blues #2-Bob Dylan, Kalamazoo

My Sweet Lorraine-Oscar Peterson Trio with Coleman Hawkins & Nat King Cole

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ayQq5AQxF0

I Haven't Either-Andy Gullahorn

'81-Joanna Newsom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mb5Jp_duKNM

Happy Saturday, friends.

andrew

Soul to Soul Our Shadows Roll

Bob Dylan played The Miller Auditorium in Kalamazoo on Friday night, an intimate little place that appears to be better suited for a production of Macbeth than a rock concert. It's in these little places that Bob usually shines, when the sound doesn't fly around up in the rafters only to be left to die. The audience is usually more attentive, as well, & since it only holds about 3000 people, you're not usually distracted by the endless amounts of people talking through the show, playing with their cell phone or getting up to get another beer. I imagine being surrounded by professors, English & history majors. Bob Dylan has something to say about the English language & American history, too.

His show on Friday was, in a sense, a history lesson, although not a linear or chronological one. His greatest strength as a songwriter has always been to marry the universal with the personal, to take a simple idea & layer it with meaning. It's never occurred to me before Friday how uniquely American Bob Dylan is, & how infused with the American landscape & history his canon is. His vision of America is one that exists outside of or in spite of 24 hour cable news channels, Walmart, strip malls, facebook & subdivisions. It tells of an America that contains the age old struggle between men & women & all of the infidelity, the heightened & diminished expectations that goes with it. The second song, It Ain't Me, Babe wonders how much does a person have to invest when they enter into a relationship, & the conclusion is maybe you'll never get everything you want out of a relationship. In looking for everything, you are forgetting what's really there. In "Beyond Here Lies Nothing", he paints a picture of a love that leads you blindly down a dark path of trouble.

There are two songs about floods, first, "The Levee's Gonna Break". The Levee's Gonna Break was written the year after Hurricane Katrina, but could be talking about either Katrina or The Great Mississippi Flood. Bob seems to be saying there have been floods in the past, & there will be floods again. On this night, he closes the song with the opening sarcastic line, "everybody saying this is a day only the Lord could make."

The second flood song of the night, Highwater (for Charley Patton) was written months before September 11. There's a little more going on with this one, the historical references to musicians, scholars & cultural places of interest where science & religion & political ideologies meet, fly by quickly. We'll start with the musicians referenced, obviously there's the great blues singer Charley Patton who's song High Water Everywhere is the precursor to this song. "I believe I'll dust my broom" comes from Robert Johnson who sold his soul to the devil so he could play guitar on Highway 61 (we'll talk about that later), "the cuckoo is a pretty bird" comes from the Appalachian folksinger Clarence Ashley. "12th street & vine" is a place that Big Joe Turner, one of the earliest people to play rock & roll most likely walked. Vicksburg, MS was effected by the Great Flood of 1927, & was where people met who were displaced by the flood. Clarksdale, MS was also effected by the great flood & was where Bessie Smith died of a car accident, also on Highway 61 Revisited. Bertha Mason was a creole character from the novel Jane Eyre. George Lewes was one of the early proponents of Darwinism, "they got Charles Darwin trapped out there on highway 5" alludes to the Scopes Trial of 1925, that place in American History where science, religion & political ideology collided. Months after the song was written, the phrase "I want him dead or alive" was uttered countless times by George W. Bush in reference to Osama Bin Laden.

In addition to being one of Dylan's greatest songs of the last twenty years, it was one of the highlights of the evening. It's current stop start arrangement, with brief harmonica breaks in between, creates an incredible tension in the song that didn't exist before.

Highway 61 Revisited, written 36 years before Highwater, refers to the Highway that goes from Duluth Minnesota where Bob Dylan grew up all the way down to Mississippi. The song deals mostly in mythical characters doing all kinds of things on Highway 61. One can imagine Robert Zimmerman hearing all of the great blues musicians from Mississippi hundreds of miles away down Highway 61 & dreaming up the mythical character of Bob Dylan.

Workingman's Blues #2 is the perfect example of Bob Dylan having a pulse on what happens in America where one man's millions is just as important (if not more) as another man's next meal. Again, though, this song written in 2006 before the economic crisis hit, could have also been applicable 70 years ago. You can easily imagine "Low wages are a reality if we want to compete abroad" being uttered in every corporate board room & factory across this country. The people who say something like this know how it effects them personally, but they don't know what it means to the low wage worker. I don't believe Bob Dylan's ever really "worked" a day in his life like he sings in the song, but somehow he gets to the heart of what it means for a man to work. Work is identity, & without it he is "forced into a life of crime". He's played it the last three times I've seen him in concert, & I can see why, it is extremely poignant. Believe it or not, there's some hope tucked away at the end. They say that poor people have an incredible sense of resiliency, & Dylan gets to the heart of that too. "I got a brand new suit & a brand new wife, I can live off rice & beans." Just before he sings this verse in concert, he steps out from behind his organ to the center of the stage. It's an incredible piece of performance art as he inhabits the character of the worker as if to say "here I am, I've got nothing to hide, what else can you do to me that hasn't already been done?".

Only in America does a line like "we drove that car as far as we could, abandoned it out west" as Dylan does in Tangled Up in Blue. Performances like these are what keep me coming to Bob Dylan shows. Despite the roughness of his voice, & often laxidasical performances, he still can bring out a performance like this. He brings his best to the first verse, & the crowd reminds him of how good a performer he can be so it builds on through the rest of the song. It's a personal tale, but it could belong to anyone, & now thanks to performances like this, it does.

There's one song that pulls all of these songs together, When the Deal Goes Down. It combines all the joys & sorrows, the despair & the hope, the faith & cynicism of all of them & condenses it into a poetic, bittersweet little song. The song is at once my grandmother's chair, the blanket my sister quilted for my unborn daughter, & my wife at home. "More frailer than the flowers, these precious hours they keep us so tightly bound". It is all the struggles & joys of a life lived together, a beautiful song & a fitting capture of Bob Dylan's patriotic rhapsody.


1. Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat
2. It Ain't Me, Babe
3. Beyond Here Lies Nothin'
4. Just Like A Woman
5. The Levee's Gonna Break
6. Tangled Up In Blue
7. Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum
8. If You Ever Go To Houston
9. High Water (For Charley Patton)
10. When The Deal Goes Down
11. Highway 61 Revisited
12. Workingman's Blues #2
13. Thunder On The Mountain
14. Ballad Of A Thin Man

(encore)
15. Jolene
16. Like A Rolling Stone