Music Day - Song In My Soul

Here's another song I inherited from my dad's music library. As far as I know, this is the only not-Christmas album he had from this band.

They were an a cappella band, but without the pretentiousness of Pentatonix. These are clean, simple, refreshing songs with no unnecessary virtuosity. There's nothing in this track that doesn't directly contribute to the pure richness of the song. These guys also write their own songs, so if you love a cappella music but you're tired of Pentatonix butchering perfectly good hymns and Christmas songs with overdone, overdramatic flourishes, this is the artist for you.

My dad listened to this song all the time when I was a kid, and now all it takes is that ascending bass intro to put a smile on my face. I still have a hard time believing that this is all done with the human voice. There's even some beatboxing in other songs on this album (keep in mind, this is 1989 in CCM -- we still don't have beatboxing in mainstream Christian music in 2021). The songs are so rich and full of backing harmonies that one doesn't even miss the band.

This song in particular is a song of unabashed joy, something I don't think any of us has seen in a good long time. It's a worship song that you'll never hear in a church. Parts of the lyric hearken back to the Psalms themselves. It's a pure, simple declaration of joy in God's handiwork. It all clips along at a very danceable, grooveable pace, and they make their point and get out of the way in less than three and a half minutes. It's cheerful and energetic and fun. If you need a quick little pick-me-up, here's a song that'll keep a spring in your step for the rest of the day.

The smile on my face comes from the smile in my heart

You put a song in my soul when You made me

You put a song in my soul and I want to let it out

Your Spirit in my life, well it makes me want to shout

I'm moved to sing with every beat in my heart

You put a song in my soul when You made me

Title: Song In My Soul

Artist: AVB

Album: Song In My Soul

Year: 1989

Label: Clifty Records

iTunes here; YouTube here (live version here -- caution, mullets abound).

The Return Of Royalty

ABBA's back.

Yes, this is old news by now, but it happened the week my grandfather died and I wanted time to process it properly.

I was the biggest ABBA fangirl in the world in my early/mid-teens. That phase ended right around the time I started this blog, actually. I still listened to ABBA songs once in a while, but they were WAY behind artists like Daniel Amos, Crumbächer, and White Heart on my most-played lists.

Then the Instagram announcement came. And fifteen-year-old Kate The ABBA Nut has returned in all of her glory.

If you haven't heard this song yet, do so. I Have Faith In You has somehow become the song of the movement, but Don't Shut Me Down is many times more upbeat and danceable. This is more the ABBA that we knew. I Have Faith In You hearkens back to endlessly slow songs like I Have A Dream, and really, that wasn't who ABBA was. Don't Shut Me Down is what ABBA was -- big and bombastic and dance-inducing. Don't let the melancholy and frail-sounding opening lines fool you -- you just wait for that piano gliss and then tell me that's not ABBA.

This is what pop music needs to be. That rich, lush instrumentation (the warm strings, the plump bass, the glorious keyboard) has been sorely lacking in pop music since the early 2000s when people decided the acoustic guitar was the only instrument that existed anymore. Everyone's talking about the harmonies (and they do sound just as clear and glorious as they did in 1982), but I challenge you to listen to the music. You simply can't make music that soars like that with a solo voice and one (1) acoustic guitar.

Even in the height of my fangirling in my teen years, I always gravitated to the 1980s output. There were only two '80s albums, but both were pure, solid gold. Up till Super Trouper, their albums usually had at least one 'filler' track. But Super Trouper (1980) and The Visitors (1981) both demonstrated a marked growth in their songwriting (possibly due to their increasing familiarity with the English language as well as increased maturity in general as the band members settled into their 30s), as well as increased richness and depth in their instrumentation. I always thought they were just beginning to hit their artistic stride in The Visitors, but of course, true art does not go over well with the masses, so ABBA called it quits.

With all that being said, this song would have fit right in on the overall glittering, shimmering album Super Trouper, perhaps right after Lay All Your Love On Me. Literally nobody in 1980 would have batted an eye. Even vocally, nothing has changed. It's as if they never stopped. It literally feels like The Visitors came out a year ago, rather than 40 years ago. That's how little their skills deteriorated. These people transcend time and trends. Don't mess with them. Even the subject matter of the song hints at this... I'm now and then combined...

It's been a rough two years, friends. Put this on and go dance a bit.

Title: Don't Shut Me Down

Artist: ABBA

Album: Voyage

Year: 2021

Pre-order on their website or iTunes, YouTube here.

Music Day - Secret To Love

Possibly one of the funnest and catchiest songs on my iPod (even counting Crumbächer's incredible contribution to the 'fun and catchy' section of my collection).

This thing starts out with bombastic drums, a head-bobbing rhythm, and a high-spirited keyboard melody before taking it down exactly enough notches for the verse to contrast with the big soaring celebratory (and above all singable) chorus. This is exactly the song you blast in your car with the windows down on a sweltering August day in the city. It's dated in all the right ways (the slightly raspy vocal, the existence of both a keyboard and band harmonies, the big drum production), and timeless in its energy and fun.

Title: Secret To Love

Artist: Halo

Album: Heaven Calling

Year: 1991

Official remastered CD available here. YouTube here.

Listen 2-3 times daily until you feel happier.

Music Day - Ashes Of Eden

I know the new ABBA songs dropped today, but I'm currently traveling due to my grandfather's funeral and haven't got time to properly do those songs justice this week. I already had this post 95% written so this is today's offering. Enjoy!

I'd heard of Breaking Benjamin before. My best friend has gone on about them for years. I always planned to look them up, but never remembered to do so.

Then, on a late night trip down a lonely highway last year, this song came up on my husband's phone. We had been making light conversation, but this song happened to pierce a lull and pique my interest. I listened in silence, hanging onto every word. The man was singing everything I had been feeling since 2015 when my entire world fell apart. I had never heard my feelings put into words so succinctly (even Terry Scott Taylor had to make a whole career out of encapsulating my feelings). The comfort that came from the intimate familiarity quite literally made me cry. My bewildered husband tried to comfort me, but the tears were tears of joy -- the sort of joy that comes when after YEARS of wasted effort and futile attempts, somebody finally understands you and your pain. They were tears of joy in the camaraderie. The man in the song was finally putting into words the questions and the longing and the prayer that my deeply wounded soul had never been able to articulate...

Will the faithful be rewarded

When we come to the end?

Will I miss the final warning

From the life that I have lived?

Is there anybody calling?

I can see the soul within

And I am not worthy

I am not worthy of this

Are You with me after all?

Why can't I hear You?

Are You with me through it all?

Then why can't I feel You?

Stay with me; don't let me go

Because there's nothing left at all

Stay with me; don't let me go

Until the ashes of Eden fall...

The song is MUCH slower than my usual pace, and I would have completely missed it in literally any other context. That song was meant for that exact moment in time, otherwise I would never have heard it.

At the same time, the release date of this album is not lost on me. 2015. The year that everything fell apart. The year that everyone and everything I ever loved died, at least in a spiritual sense. The year that broke my heart into so many pieces that I will never be able to repair it. The year that caused my permanent mental and emotional limp. This album was right there, existing in the world at the same time as my shattered shell, and I missed it when I needed it the most. In a way, that makes me angry. I wonder what kind of person I would have been had I heard that album the year it was first released. Yes, it provided a healing balm for me in 2020, but how much more effective would it have been in 2015, when the wound was still raw and pouring blood?

There's no way to know. If we're being perfectly honest, I probably would have snubbed it at the time, as I generally do with 99% of new music. Heck, I hated even some of my favourite albums that year. I had been a massive ABBA fangirl for well over five years and I found myself literally skipping past my favourite ABBA songs in 2015 because it was too much to process music over the immense amount of pain. I could only manage to listen to three albums (Crumbächer's Escape From The Fallen Planet, Terry Scott Taylor's A Briefing For The Ascent, and Russ Taff's self-titled 1987 album), and it stayed that way for nearly a year.

I just have to accept the little bit of healing this song can offer me now. I suppose it's better than nothing. And it is a beautiful arrangement. Sparse strings and light drums add to the big loneliness of the song and keep the lyrics -- the true star -- front and centre.

Song: Ashes Of Eden

Artist: Breaking Benjamin

Album: The Dark Before The Dawn

Year: 2015

iTunes here; YouTube here.