Set Apart - The Silverwind Album Nobody Talks About

21 June 2021, 12.39pm.

Today I'm going to show a little love to the bastard Silverwind album.

I'll be honest... I hated this album when I first heard it. Hated it. I had been a Silverwind fangirl for several years by that point, and fourteen-year-old me wanted nothing more than to be the next Betsy Hernandez. Her voice is still my favourite female voice ever, in any genre, bar none.

When I plunked Set Apart (1986) onto the turntable and heard thick alto harmonies coming through the speakers, I felt betrayed. It was like I'd been punched in the gut. It took me over five years to realise that actually, the hyped-up '80s tracks and the sweet, calming harmonies that balanced them were really quite good. Had the voice been Betsy Hernandez's, this would have instantly become my favourite album of all time, but the shock of the very different voices made this album a slow burner. And, from what I can gather online in all my music-nerd groups, I was not the only one who felt this way.

Certainly, the trio that replaced Hernandez, Banov, and Gramling were very talented singers who blended beautifully, but the change in sound was so sudden and drastic that it was hard to look past the change to the album itself, or even the strengths of the singers that replaced the original three. It's no surprise that despite the beauty of the songwriting, the harmonies, and the instrumentation, this was the last album to bear the Silverwind name -- the change was simply too great to overcome in one album, and in the music business, one album is all it takes to sink you as a recording act. The producers tried to soften the blow by having Betsy Hernandez sing guest vocals on two of the songs, but it was too little, too late.

And yet... this album is a banger. It was ahead of its time while keeping one foot firmly planted in the gentle Maranatha keyboard/string machine sound a CCM audience would be looking for. In fact, the production and arranging was so cutting edge for the time that if you were to play me this album for the first time with no background information and ask me what year it was from, I would guess 1989. The saxophone sounds, the woodwind-esque keyboards, the synth stings, the occasional squarewave bass, the very electric guitar -- all these were motifs that were not yet mainstream in 1986. The opening track (I'm Forever Yours) may have the biggest drums in CCM this side of Mylon LeFevre and Broken Heart's Crack The Sky. In fact, the drums are a huge part of the entire record -- even the mellow songs. Just listen to Heart Of Love and tell me you can't see that song in front of a live audience of thousands having the absolute time of their lives.

Lyrically, this is still very much a Silverwind album. Simple, honest lyrics of childlike wonder and heartfelt praise still abound here. Most of the songs were still written by the Hernandez and Hernandez husband/wife team -- in fact the clarity and quality of the lyrics here takes a marked leap. This album is full of striking lyrical gems, such as But once you've seen the sun, there isn't anyone / Who is able to persuade you it's not there... (I Believe In You), or  No manufactured fake or forgery / No counterfeit could make a fool of me / I've found a love so real / A power I can feel... (Heart Of Love -- this bit is just so fun to sing), or God's heart was broken to make me my own... (Crystal Heart) or They say you're wise as you grow older / But all I know is I've grown colder... (First Love).

As to the quality of the voices -- the harmonies are still catchy and dare I say addicting. They're just different, and once you get past that, they're truly enjoyable. Silverwind has often been called the 'Christian ABBA' due to the soaring harmonies, and that nickname is still relevant even with the personnel change. Even this is actually a step up from the previous album, By His Spirit. BHS relied heavily on Hernandez, with the other two members singing lead on only one song each (though to be fair, who wouldn't give in to the temptation to feature such an angelic voice so much?). In Set Apart, vocal duties are pretty much divided equally between the women, even within individual songs, and one hears some lovely male solos on Side B (First Love is a beautifully emotional performance). Older Silverwind relegated the harmonies largely to choruses, but Set Apart Silverwind used them everywhere, and it made their swan song truly shine. If you hold out through the initial style shock until the penultimate track (I Believe In You), you'll be rewarded with a strong and powerfully-sung glimpse of classic Silverwind.

It was really context that sunk this album. If it hadn't been released under the Silverwind name, with all of the sonic and vocal expectations that came with that name, I daresay this album would have blown up. This was the most rocking female-led album in mainstream CCM at the time (Leslie Phillips' magnum opus The Turning was not yet released, and Margaret Becker wouldn't make her debut for another year), and definitely the hardest-hitting worship record to date (Petra's Petra Praise... The Rock Cries Out was still three years away). Yet it remains the only album of Silverwind's catalogue that has never seen a CD release and consistently gets either hated on or not mentioned at all among fans of the group.

It's really a shame that this record didn't have a better chance at life. It's a really strong album in almost every respect, and I'm glad I stuck with it long enough to see that. I encourage you to do the same.

You can listen to it on YouTube here.

Music Day - Desert Rose

I really only have two criteria for Music Day posts: 1. It must be legally available for purchase; and 2. It should be a song that means a lot to me at the time of writing.

This is a song that I always glossed over. White Heart has so many loud, interesting complex songs that I was very confused by this ballad's immense popularity. If you mention the name 'White Heart' (to anybody who even knows who White Heart is), this is, nine times out of ten, the first song they mention. And that boggled my mind -- what about Let The Kingdom Come? What about Raging Of The Moon? What about Heaven Of My Heart? I do primarily listen for the lyrics more than the music, but in ten years of listening, I never 'got' the lyrics to this particular song.

Until now.

I am currently living in a VERY remote 'small town' that is literally an hour and a half drive from any other civilisation. There are no arts, no theatre, no dance classes, not even a freakin Staples. We've talked of moving but small tourist towns like this have a way of hiking grocery and gas prices so high that it is literally impossible to put together any kind of savings in order to actually do it (gas prices have been $1.43 a litre here since July; meanwhile my parents three hours north are zipping around on $1.17 gas. In the same province).

I don't have dance and I don't have money. I'm just watching my dream wither and die without practice. And I've been crying out to God, asking why He gave me this dream only to take it away again; terrified that I'm going to die in this literal hole in the ground, completely forgotten. I'm terrified of proving my program director right when he said I would never amount to anything.

Is this one of those desert experiences that so many people in the Bible went through -- Moses, the Israelites, Elijah, Jesus...? Is there still some important thing I'm supposed to do forty years from now and I just have to go through the motions until then?

I still feel angry and ignored sometimes when I think about how Brittney and M and my cousin died and I'm still here. It's not survivor's guilt so much as it is jealousy. They already live in a place where mercy is unreceipted, but I'm not lucky enough to get that chance. Given the choice between life and death, I would absolutely pick death. I'm not suicidal, per se, but I wouldn't fight death if it came for me. This world is not my home, and I want to go home. I don't even really know what 'home' is, but I know this world isn't it. I'm just so weary of life here.

And it's hard not to despair completely when all you see is the desert rising up on all sides -- literally.

(Forgot I was supposed to be doing a Music Day post. Pretending those last five paragraphs never happened.)

The song opens with a mellow but very classic '80s keyboard intro that hints at some of the haunting woodwind flavours that the band would explore in more depth on their next album Tales Of Wonder. And the tender, clear, angelic voice of Rick Florian (who I still maintain in the greatest singer to walk the face of the earth, even after five years of listening to music of all eras and genres while acquiring a BA in Music) comes in, painting a picture of an ocean of featureless sand and the tiny beauty drowning in it.

And you wonder

You wonder

Can you last much longer

This cloud you live under

Will it cover you?

The chorus features White Heart at their band-harmony peak. Harmony was something that White Heart always excelled at (their best-known line-ups featured a minimum of four competent vocalists), and it shimmers here, floating along on that bed of gentle keyboard that Mark Gersmehl weaves throughout the song.

Sometimes holiness

Can seem like emptiness

When you feel the whole world's laughing eyes

This is the part that resonates with me. I feel abandoned, alone, empty, tossed to the side, unwanted, unneeded, and useless. I feel like I and my life have been wasted and I'm just a shell of all my old dreams and potential just shuffling around waiting to die.

After the second chorus, the heretofore muted harmonies go from backdrop to centre stage, filling the song with layers and that beautiful '80s 'big' production. Chris McHugh's fantastic drums go a long way here too, and the effect is so lush and rich that it was several years of listening to this album non-stop (because of the title track and Storyline) before I realised that there isn't actually a verse here, only vocalising and a bit of vamping from Florian. (They pull off the same stunt in their song Let The Kingdom Come from their previous album, but that time they did it by distracting the listener with truly epic guitars, giant drums, and energetic rock vocals.)

Title: Desert Rose

Artist: White Heart

Album: Powerhouse

Year: 1990

Label: Sparrow Records

iTunes here; YouTube here.

Heaven knows

Heaven knows

He will hold your tender heart

Oh desert rose...

Music Day - Kyrie

 How have I not featured this one yet?

Yeah, okay, it's more well-known than 99% of stuff I post on this blog, but that's for good reason. This song -- as the kids say -- slaps. This is the song that inspired my best novel. This is one of the most soaring songs from an entire decade defined by music that soared. How in the world have I not featured this?

If you, like me, were sheltered as a child, you may not know of this song, and that's okay. In fact, that's great, because now you're old enough to remember your first time hearing it instead of just always sort of being aware of it, and that's honestly a really special thing. Get comfortable. Relax. Take a couple deep breaths. Prepare to be enchanted.

The song starts out with Richard Page calling out the title exactly as the original Greek intended -- as a plaintive cry of the heart, soft and distant across the desert of life. God have mercy.

We get a percussive synth buildup, a guitar hit, and glorious big drums. The verse is great. Page has the perfect smooth-but-passionate voice for a harder pop song like this, especially one with more introspective lyrics. But the real magic happens once you hit the chorus.

It's big. It's bombastic. It's shimmering. It's looking up at a thousand stars at night and pondering the galaxies beyond -- an exercise that might inspire one to echo Page's heart-cry. God have mercy.

God have mercy down the road that I must travel

God have mercy through the darkness of the night

God have mercy -- where I'm going, will You follow?

God have mercy on a highway in the light...

This is not a party-pop song. This is a song written by a pensive person reflecting on their life -- both what has come and gone as well as what lies dimly ahead. The chorus is literally a prayer -- a rather upbeat and danceable one, but a prayer nonetheless. The fact that they took a lyric like this and made it into one of the biggest pop-rock anthems of the decade (as track 7 on a vinyl album to boot) is a testament to the band's skill. (It was not a fluke either -- see also Broken Wings.)

And just when you think that spine-chilling chorus literally cannot get any better, all the instruments drop out except those phenomenal drums and those soaring band harmonies, crying for mercy like the monks in the choirs who first put those Greek words to music, but even earlier than that, like the tax collector named Zacchaeus who not only repaid what he stole, but quadrupled the return payment, like the woman clothed in little more than jewellery and makeup as she dumped perfume on Jesus' feet, like the ragged scrap of skin writhing on the cross next to Jesus as he asked to taste a small morsel of the Kingdom.

It was a well-crafted pop hit, to be sure. But it came from a place of honesty that leveled it up above anything that today's carefully-curated pop songwriting teams could ever hope to attain. Skill and experience certainly helped this song -- there's no question that Page and co. have copious amounts of both -- but those alone can seem sterile when not taken into the stratosphere with a gut-level lyric like this.

Listen and be amazed, whether for the first time or the thousandth time.

Title: Kyrie

Artist: Mr. Mister

Album: Welcome To The Real World

Year: 1985

iTunes here; YouTube here.

When I was young I thought of growing old

Of what my life would mean to me

Would I have followed down my chosen road

Or only wished what I could be...?

Music Day - The Fine Line

Fell in love with this song last summer. After years of hearing about Adam Again and how great they were, it was this song that finally hooked me. It's actually about drugs -- which I know basically nothing about -- but it's so funky and cynical that I love it anyway. I don't usually like blues or jazz music, but here the band blends both genres with rock and the result is so fresh and different that you can't help but be entranced by it. If we're honest, though, my favourite part is the brooding chorus vocal from Riki Michele. It adds a little bit of sizzle to an already steaming song. My next favourite part is the syncopated guitar line at the beginning of the interlude (what can I say, it's the tap dancer in me).

Fun fact: Jon Knox of White Heart fame also drummed for this band.

Title: The Fine Line
Artist: Adam Again
Album: Homeboys
Year: 1990
iTunes here; YouTube here.

The devil in black
Break your mama's back
Feeling like a maniac...

P.S. -- There is a Kickstarter campaign NOW UNDER WAY (right here) to reissue their 1995 album Perfecta on CD and vinyl. Deadline to pledge is 30 June. Don't miss out on this! I funded last year's campaign to give Homeboys the same treatment, and I have no regrets.

How To Make A 'Worship Song' And Get Super Famous

11 January 2014, 11.30pm.

WARNING: Major sarcasm alert. This is definitely not for the easily offended.

How to make a 'good' 'worship' song (note the liberal use of sarcastic quotes):

Things you need:
A mega-church, preferably in Texas somewhere.
A YouTube account.
The services of a professional video recording/production company.
A 'band name,' usually consisting of the name of your church with the word 'worship' tacked on the end.
Several thousand people to fill your auditorium during the set (mostly in the early-twenties demographic).

Step 1: Load up the stage.
Atmospheric purple lighting (yes, it must be purple), super troupers, an otherwise dim auditorium, three to seven guitarists, a drum set in a shadowed corner, one electric piano, a lone vocalist in the centre of the stage with a microphone and an iPad very prominently displayed on a music stand/pulpit.
If the vocalist is male, he must have an acoustic guitar and a mic stand. He should also be wearing a white or light-coloured button-up shirt which should not be tucked into his black skinny jeans. For maximum 'relevance' (how I loathe that word!), he should also be wearing Crocs. The successful worship pastor will also have a beard and at least one large, very visible, ambiguous tattoo.
If the vocalist is female, her hair should be shoulder-length, straightened, and preferably dark-coloured. Make-up is acceptable and in fact encouraged (for relevance, of course -- after all, God doesn't make mistakes, right?). She should wear a dark-coloured top, skinny jeans and shoes that are fashionable and expensive-looking (though not necessarily actually expensive). Jewelry is restricted to a couple of metallic-coloured bangles and maybe some dangle earrings. She is also forbidden to have her eyes open for more than a total of six seconds of the entire song.
Note that everybody on the stage must be white, with the possible exception of a female vocalist (who may be of Asian or possibly Hispanic descent in order to demonstrate that God loves people from all races).

Step 2: The intro.
If the vocalist is female: Put a female blonde with straightened hair in front of the keyboard. Have her play an extremely slow phrase in 4/4 time, preferably using only whole notes, but half and quarter notes are permitted in extreme circumstances. She must repeat this exact phrase, over and over and over again, in excess of six or seven minutes. She must also close her eyes, slowly shake her head from side to side at appropriate moments, and gently sway her upper body forward and backward as if hypnotised (this sends the very clear message to the audience -- sorry, 'congregation' -- that they too should be hypnotised by the revolutionary F-C-G chord progression).
If the vocalist is male: It is acceptable, in extraordinary cases, to use the classic drumstick-time-signature intro, but nothing too exuberant. Temper the enthusiasm. The all-powerful God might go deaf, you know. However, for 'slower' songs, follow the piano intro as described under the 'female vocalist' heading.

*Please note that throughout the remainder of this guide we will be assuming you're going for the more common and more boring -- sorry, powerful -- slower worship song.

Step 3: The first verse.
The first verse (actually, the only verse) should deal primarily with the subject of oneself and one's warm fuzzy feelings -- 'how You loved me,' 'how You save me,' 'oh, what You've done for me,' et cetera. Actually focusing on God and worshipping Him due to His beauty and goodness and might would be absurd and might 'turn off' your ultra-hip, 'seeking' crowd. The vocalist's eyes, as previously noted, should be closed. If female, she should also shake her head side to side, slowly, at appropriate moments (usually on the words 'how' and 'You'). Halfway through the first verse, the drummer should do a soft roll on the cymbals (author's note: I'm pretty sure that's not what they're actually called, but I don't know what the correct name is). Also note that the use of complete and/or logical sentences in the song structure is optional and in fact discouraged.

Step 4: The chorus.
The volume of the keyboard may change here, to signify that we are now entering the chorus part and that the audience/congregation should raise their hands and close their eyes accordingly. (If you want to get really radical, the keyboardist can change keys. But be careful! You should not attempt this unless you have at least a Bachelor's in music and even then this should not be attempted more than once per concert -- sorry, service.) The vocals become more earnest. The lyrics should consist of the same phrase repeated over and over again. Again, proper grammar and syntax should be avoided at all costs.

Step 5: The remainder of the song.
The rest of the song consists of the chorus being repeated at least a half a dozen times. The instruments then fade out, and the chorus is repeated a cappella about two dozen times (audience participation is heavily encouraged, if not politely demanded). Then the instruments come back in and the audience and musicians repeat the chorus in a slow, gentle sort of way, while the vocalist raises one hand (if female), or both hands (if male) and tilts their face upwards with a rapturous look on their face. Be careful that the eyes stay closed. They may speak or sing a random assortment of the following very handy stock phrases:
'Cry out to Him.'
'Thank Him.'
'Yes, Lord.'
'We love you, Lord.'
...and so on. They may also repeat lines from the chorus one phrase before everyone else sings them. Be very careful here. You could make or break the song at this point. Don't you dare open your eyes -- it'll kill the atmosphere of spontaneity. Be very reluctant to let the song go. You should at this point be pushing the seven-or-eight-minute mark. Eventually, long after everyone's bored out of their minds (but won't admit it because they had been trained to feel ashamed of boredom in a 'worship service'), let the song fade to oblivion... very... very... slowly. For best results, let the song fade so it sounds like it's ending, then after murmuring the chorus a cappella once or twice, bring it back again and continue for a while, then let it fade. Repeat. Ad nauseum.

Step 6: Fame and fortune.
Put the professionally-recorded full-length live video of the song on YouTube. Send the link to your local Christian radio station. Get a CD put into the Christian bookstores (be certain the album cover has a picture of the crowd -- I mean congregation -- on both the front and the back to show how serious you are about your worship concerts -- sorry, services). Make thousands of dollars as the Christian-consumer-culture drones buy everything with your name on it. Be fangirled over by every female Christian ever.

Tip: The slower and more reluctant the song is to end, the more people will call your song 'powerful' and 'moving.' This translates directly into sales. Just be careful to keep that script of humility at the forefront of your memory. As soon as you stray from the 'we never expected this, wow, God is moving in this generation' script, you will be blacklisted by the loving Christian community.

You're welcome.

Music Day - Darn Floor, Big Bite

Originally written January 2014.


I got Darn Floor - Big Bite for Christmas [2013]. I'm falling in love with this band all over again.

I've wanted this album for a while. As soon as you begin to integrate yourself into the DA fanbase, you hear nothing except how good this album is. Even the gorgeous Dig Here Said The Angel couldn't top it for a good cross-section of the fans.

The CD is available on their website, but due to the fact that I bought Dig Here three times (digital, CD, and vinyl) (the vinyl arrived the day before New Year's and HOLY DEUCE it is beautiful), plus the ¡Alarma! reissue, I had no money left for DFBB. I was okay with waiting, but until I did get the CD, I took a vow of Darn Floor celibacy.

See, when I first ordered the Vox Humana CD, I totally overdosed on Travelog, William Blake, and (It's The Eighties, So Where's Our) Rocket Packs on YouTube while waiting for it to arrive. When it finally did arrive, listening to it was sort of anticlimactic. Not because it's not a good album (I think I actually listen to Vox Humana the most, overall), but because I already knew what was coming. So I didn't want to ruin the album that so many called DA's masterpiece before I could actually listen to it all at once at my leisure (the same way I first got to experience the masterpiece that is Dig Here). So I didn't listen to any of the songs on YouTube, I didn't preview them on iTunes, I didn't read the lyrics on the Daniel Amos website. I wanted to know nothing about the album until I had it in my hands... whenever that might be.

Naturally, DFBB was at the top of my Christmas wish list (literally), and since I'm basically impossible to buy for, my family sticks pretty darn closely to that list. It wasn't too much of a surprise to unwrap that one. And there was much rejoicing (and answering of the question, "Darn Floor, Big Bite? What the heck kind of album title is that?").

I will restrain myself from fangirling over the entire album here (oh, but am I ever tempted...). Today I'll stick to one song -- the title track.

I have a question about this song: how was this not a monster hit? It is infectious, catchy, fun to listen to, catchy, deep, poetic, catchy, intense, and heck, it would even be a great karaoke song. Did I mention it's catchy? You can't not bop your head to this. Seriously, I'll listen to this once in the morning after breakfast and I'll be dancing to the darn thing all day long. It's great.

It starts out with an irresistible bass/drum rhythm. Baptists, turn away, for the beat menace has come to vex your soul. You will dance to this, whether you like it or not. (This is church-ese for 'This song grooves like a boss.') I love the swagger in Terry Taylor's vocal here, especially how it later gives way to questioning -- without losing the swagger.

I also like the lyrical structure of the song, especially that doubtful repetition of every third line of the verses: Do I know You now? Do I know You now?... Will You save me now? Will You save me now?... Could have been a dream; Could have been a dream...

The musical structure is amazing too. It starts with the bass groove and the drums, then for the pre-chorus, the rhythm changes into a rolling, warbling guitar line before stripping the sound back to drums and bass for the chorus. At the end, after the final chorus when Terry's repeating No I can't get it right... they start into a good old classic rock thing (complete with cymbals), then it concludes with a deep graceful bow.

Fantastic stuff. If you don't listen to anything else I feature on Music Day, listen to this one.

Title: Darn Floor - Big Bite
Artist: Daniel Amos
Album: Darn Floor - Big Bite
Year: 1987
Label: Frontline
iTunes here; YouTube here.
Buy the deluxe two-disc edition of the album directly from the band here. (You won't regret it, I promise.)

Also, for those not familiar with Daniel Amos lore: The 'darn floor - big bite' theme of both this song and the album came from the story of Koko the gorilla, who, when asked to describe an earthquake, signed 'Darn floor. Big bite.' Inspired by this story, Daniel Amos/Terry Scott Taylor spent the entire DFBB album exploring the analogy of humans in Koko's place, trying to describe God with mere [sign] language. The results are quite stunning. The poetic value (of the lyrics) alone is breath-taking.

You touch my hair and cheek sometimes
Feel in yourself this flesh and blood
My poor flesh and blood...
I think I met an angel once
But I can't really know for sure
Do I know you now
Do I know you now?

Music Day - Crack The Sky

I like this song because it's different. It does not start with a few mellow acoustic guitar chords. It starts out with a thundering drum (I'm always reminded of the sound of horses galloping) and a rocking guitar before it falls into a gritty bass line. The rest of the song is pretty normal '80s-Christian-rock fare, but the relentless drumming absolutely makes the song. (It almost goes without saying that I'm a sucker for the chorus medley on the keyboard.) Plus, the guitar solo simply soars. As I listen to this again, I'm reminded of DeGarmo & Key, circa Streetlight or D&K.

Title: Crack The Sky
Artist: Mylon LeFevre & Broken Heart
Album: Crack The Sky
Year: 1987
Label: Word Records
iTunes here; YouTube here.


COMING UP NEXT WEEK: I'll be reviewing John Schlitt's new album The Christmas Project, released this past Tuesday. Does it measure up to the standards of this Christmas music purist and that doppelgänger of hers who loves a good rock song? Find out next Friday...

Music Day - Powerhouse

This is perfect rocking-out concert material (see Exhibit A and Exhibit B). Big drums, big hair, great guitar riff, rumbling bass, and Rick Florian.

It starts with with a solid guitar riff, then the drums and bass come in and together they build a great little nest of straight-up rock goodness for Rick's vocals to slide into a few measures later. Halfway through the first verse you begin to hear a little bit of keyboard. Rick himself sounds just a touch edgier than he does on some of the earlier projects -- even the rockier songs on the previous album, Freedom, featured very clean vocals where he was concerned (which, now that I think about it, is precisely why I love this his singing so much. It takes a lot of skill to keep a clean vocal when you're singing Power Tools).

And now back to today's song...

I've always liked that guitar riff sliding down into the chorus, and then the band vocals burst on the scene: 'Pow-er-house!' In the second and subsequent choruses, there's quite a lot going on vocally -- band vocals, backing vocals, Rick's lead...

They take it down (slightly) for eight sets of eight, just long enough to give the song some texture (and add some light keyboard and a sort of otherworldly 'Power...' from Rick), then the guitar chugs back in and blazes through a solo that's loud if nothing else, and then it all stops, everything, and just the band shouts again 'Pow-er-house!'

And with a sparkling keyboard, the chorus kicks back in. I think my favourite part is just at the end of the chorus, that last high hold from Rick (We need the powerhouse...) and then the drum sort of 'stutters' before the guitar comes back in and does kind of a reprise of the solo (it actually sounds a little out of place here, but the sheer passion with which it's played makes it tolerable).

Title: Powerhouse

Artist: White Heart

Album: Powerhouse

Year: 1990

Label: Star Song

iTunes here; YouTube here.

Go ahead, crank it and roll down the window. If anybody asks, it's summer's last hurrah -- those are always allowed to be 1990 arena rock. (Beyond Belief, anyone?)

Music Day

It's my birthday today and you know what that means... it's White Heart Month here at the Edge Of The Dream! (Provided, of course, that the iTunes Store actually has five White Heart songs that I haven't already featured.)

The other day I was listening to White Heart's Freedom album on my iPod. It's a totally different experience on the iPod -- headphones always make the mix sound better anyway, but this specific album is heaven on earth through headphones. Plus, this album just means so, so much to me -- track two, Sing Your Freedom, has gone down in this blog's history as the first piece of choreography I ever completed, Eighth Wonder holds the distinction of being the first piece of my choreography to be publicly performed, and the phenomenal opener Bye Bye Babylon was the song that catapulted White Heart firmly into the slot of 'My Favourite Band Ever Of All Time.' I listen to my CD copy of the album that I ripped from my mother's well-loved cassette at least twice a week, probably more.

I rarely listen to it on my iPod though. Usually I listen to my iPod when choreographing a specific song, and I tend to listen to full albums on CD as I'm driving places in the rattletrap.

However, Freedom is different on the iPod not because of sound quality, but because of the tracklist. As I mentioned, my Freedom CD was originally a tape. Then, several months after I created it, I found out that the original CD release of the album had an extra track sandwiched in between The River Will Flow and Let It Go, a track which I assume was excluded from the cassette and vinyl releases due to time constraints (though don't quote me on that). iTunes had the track (for once -- pause while we give sarcastic applause), but I'd already burned the CD and didn't want a perfectly good CD to go to waste. So I still listen to the cassette version but because I'm a purist, I have the official CD tracklist on the iPod.

So the other day as I was listening to the album on my iPod, I suddenly went 'holy crap I forgot about this song!'

Title: Set The Bridge On Fire
Artist: White Heart
Album: Freedom
Year: 1989
Label: Sparrow
iTunes here; YouTube here.

This is a freaking good song. Guitar, bass, keys, drums... everyone is in top form here. The interlude is one of the best I've ever heard. It's not just a standard 'insert guitar solo here' deal, every instrument gets to play. The synth, real soft and gentle (yet it manages to be stately) and then the guitar rips through and the bass and a different guitar comes in and then...

There's even a great little acoustic guitar riff at the end of each verse. The rest of the song is hardcore rock, but somehow they make that little acoustic bit work.

Even the rhythm is great -- driving, and not quite centered.

Fans often cite this as one of Rick's best vocal performances to date (along with Desert Rose, How Many Times, Dr Jekyll And Mr Christian, Sing Your Freedom, Unchain, et cetera et cetera...), and the title is well deserved. He simply soars here. It sounds so effortless.

Lyrically, the song makes some good points. It doesn't beat the visual to death, but it explores it just enough to make you really think about it. Do you really want to live forever in that headspace of regretting the things you've done, the times you've messed up?


Great message. Phenomenal performance. If you only own one White Heart song, this should be a contender.

Bonus Music Day!

Okay, so this is kind of a cheater Music Day post because I can't post any links yet (not even YouTube -- this is so hot off the press YouTube doesn't have it yet). But it's too exciting to not talk about.

Yes, folks -- I have heard the new Daniel Amos album.

Literally two hours after my 'official' Music Day post last week Friday (the 21st), Daniel Amos posted on Facebook that the download link for the Kickstarter supporters was coming soon. I was going to leave it till the next day, but then I saw someone in the comments say that had downloaded it already.

No way... It couldn't be...

I checked my email. Sure enough, there was a download link. Cue the suppressed screaming (it was one in the morning, after all...).

Before I begin, it's worth noting that (for those who missed it), I'm a DA fan as of February of this year. I've had to cram their entire thirty-plus year career into the last five months. Therefore, I don't know everything there is to know about them and their songs (yet). I'm fairly well-acquainted with their eighties stuff, but once we get into the nineties my knowledge drops to almost nothing. I haven't heard Mr Buechner's Dream (their previous album) in its entirety, but I've taken a cursory listening of... probably about half of the songs on it.

I'm dithering. Can you tell I'm dithering? Reviewing something so fantastic is psyching me out because there's no way I'll ever be able to do it justice (to read reviews by better-versed music fans, see the links at the bottom of this post).

*deep breath*

Overall -- this thing is amazing and I love it. It sounds like nothing else I've ever heard. Ever. Timeless stuff -- the best there is.

Also, keyboards! Pretty keyboards! Oh man, some of the keyboard work is gorgeous... I'll get into that more when I talk about the specific songs (I'm definitely going to run out of adjectives). In fact, every instrument is spectacular here. One could probably take lessons from these guys just by listening to this album on repeat.

Lyrically, the album talks about death and dying quite a bit, but one of the first impressions I got of the overall album was how hope-filled it is. There just seems to be an air of hope, of quiet rest in God and His plan. (Also, current CCM 'artists' (and I use the term very loosely) -- note that not once does Terry use the words 'don't you know He loves you?' or 'just lean on Him' as if the listener is a complete idiot (though said listener apparently somehow knows the magnitude of God's love, as it's never explained in those songs).)

Forward In Reverse -- The album starts out with a gentle acoustic guitar and then a pretty flutish sound, and then that familiar voice begins singing... a wonderfully poetic list of clichés, flipped backwards and twisted slightly. In the second verse, a horn of some kind comes in, adding a bit of whimsy. As I listen to it again, it inexplicably makes me think of Dr Seuss (don't even try to understand why -- I don't). And I totally love the whooshing sound effect after the second chorus -- a great sonic interpretation of the title.

Jesus Wept -- Oh man... the keyboard melody in the 'let me out... no not yet' bit. The guitar is wonderfully fuzzy (and not overpowering) and I like the drumming. Gorgeous, gorgeous poetic imagery here: I pound against the walls of my aging skin... Who'll untie the ropes that restrain my wings... They mounted up like eagles; now they're dropping like flies... It's kind of odd, hearing melancholy lyrics in such an upbeat song, but it's not without hope: Before He danced, Jesus wept. Speaking as a young adult whose life is in total upheaval right now, I'm very thankful for that reminder.

Dig Here Said The Angel -- Best. Intro. Ever. I think it's backmasking. Whatever it is, it's awesome. And then the bass (I think) comes growling in over the backmasking (I think it's a guitar going backwards -- or perhaps forward in reverse?*). And then they start humming. I'm a sucker for the humming thing, I don't know why. Maybe because it's so rare. I love that he doesn't start singing until the minute and a half mark -- just lets the intro do its thing first. The guitar here is so so cool... the distortion. And in the chorus, the keyboard -- almost sci-fi like, piping, flutish. You know, all that 'sonic' futuristic stuff everybody did in the mid-eighties and early nineties? It's kind of like that. And the harmony in the last chorus -- so pretty. And then they hum it out with some nice deep rolling drum hits before falling back into the backmasking to end the song. Epic song. I could fly on this song.

Our New Testament Best -- Man, the groove... between the bass and Terry's low vocals, your foot will be tapping. And the keyboards after the second chorus... It's the sound of falling rain. Seriously. My heart stops every time. I wish it would last longer, but the fact that it's so fleeting makes it more beautiful when you get to hear it. And then the guitar comes in over the rain sound and then the song kicks up a bit into the chorus repeats.

Love Grace And Mercy -- This one was an instant favourite, as soon as the vocalising started before the first verse. This sounds more like the Terry I'm used to (in the eighties, with the higher voice). Also, my favourite lyric of the entire album is in here: 'Love grace and mercy; They shake me to the core; Lift me higher than a kite then; Leave me crawling on the floor.' So accurate. The mix of fuzzy guitar and bells in the interlude (and later in the ending) absolutely makes the song.
Bit of a heads-up here: There's this one line -- So to hell with my excuses... I don't know if the word hell in that context is really an issue anymore in the age of Facebook where every other post contains the f-word, but it's something to keep in mind if you happen to have young children living in the house or something.

Now That I've Died -- This one surprised me musically. I wasn't expecting something quite that rock-y. (You'd think I'd know better than to judge a song -- especially one with Terry Scott Taylor's fingerprints on it -- by its title.) It's one of the rockiest songs on the album. At first I thought he was talking about dying to self (the Biblical teaching of turning away from evil desires and instead pursuing the things of God), but on reading the lyrics, it also kind of sounds like he's talking as if he were in Heaven, trying to describe it to someone still on earth. I quite enjoy his delivery of the title line, and the line I'm never cynical (but still a little sarcastic) is perhaps the funniest on the album (especially in the context of Terry's past work, like, say, the ¡Alarma! Chronicles or his solo album The Miracle Faith Telethon). I like the ending, when they get into that I've never been more alive/Now that I've died vocal layering. And I like the keyboards in that part too.

We'll All Know Soon Enough -- I'm still microanalysing this song lyrically. Even knowing TST's lyrical bent for sarcasm (but not cynicism, of course...) in all forms, it was quite a shock to my Baptist-raised reformed-theology-nerd-in-training ears to hear the line 'There may be no heaven, no no no; There may be no hell, no...' I think -- I think -- he may be taking the perspective of a person trying to 'use' God to have a comfortable life (á la Angels Tuck You In and New Car!**) and then being disappointed when God doesn't answer his every prayer with a 'yes.' Yet the verses seem so sincere and well-rooted that it's a bit of a stretch to take the chorus (and the line quoted above) as anything less sincere and Biblically accurate. The bass and drum drive of the verses is cool though, and I quite like the effect of the synthesized vocal in the bridge. Listening to that through headphones is so cool -- the vocal comes only through the right speaker, and the sparse instrumentation comes only through the left. Actually, the first time I heard this I found out later I'd had my earbuds mixed up so I heard the vocal through my left ear. I think I now have to switch my earbuds whenever I hear this song because it sounds wrong with the vocal in my right ear.

Waking Up Under Water -- This song doesn't gently ease you into things. It grabs and doesn't let go. It starts with a blasting guitar, and then a driving beat and such an honest lyric -- about trying to escape real life by daydreaming. Lyrically, this could almost have fit on Doppelgänger. The bass is fantastic, just rocks along.

The Uses Of Adversity -- Am I the only one who hears a Newsboys vibe in that guitar bit between the verses? Actually, the Newsboys feel surfaces several times throughout the song. It's a beautiful lyric, though. Very poetic, and lovely, if painful, in its surrender to the supremacy of God (So don't send me rain if I bloom in drought...).

The Ruthless Hum Of Dread -- I think I may forever be calling this one 'The Ruthless Drum of Ed' after that one YouTube video they posted of Ed McTaggert doing drums for this. Very well-orchestrated... sparse instrumentation, soft vocals. It's delivered like a lullaby, only the protagonist can't shake the fears that run through his head as he tries to sleep (...night fears slip in between hissing sheets and springs; And in the folds of my sibilant bed...). The third verse is gorgeous -- the drumming stops, and only the odd piano chord backs the vocals. Some of the imagery in the last verse reminds me of the lyrical content of Terry's solo albums Knowledge & Innocence (1986) and A Briefing For The Ascent (1987). Melancholy but chock-full of wonderful poetic imagery.

The Sun Shines On Everyone -- A bit of an anthem, feeling almost like a reprise more than a closing track. It's already becoming quite a favourite among the DA fans on Facebook, but it drags a bit for me. To be honest I've yet to properly focus on this song from start to finish because of that. The lyrics are nice though. Perhaps it'll grow on me yet.


Honestly, I don't think there's a throwaway lyric on the entire album, and there is nothing, musically, that doesn't feel perfect throughout (though I found the studio applause at the end of the last song cheesy, but that's neither music nor lyric.)

I would have loved to have gone more in-depth with this (I could probably write a thesis on this album), but I will have to click the 'Publish' button in spite of the perfectionist in my mind screaming for me to revise some more, or else this will never get posted. Perhaps at a later date, once I've had more time to listen and memorise and find nuances and simply enjoy it, I'll revisit the album on this blog. But for now, this is what you get, plus a recommendation from yours truly to buy it when it releases later this summer (they gave a tentative date for August). Or at the very least, buy the title track and Love, Grace, And Mercy. After that, the next two you should buy are Jesus Wept and Waking Up Under Water. And after that, you need to just give up and buy the CD.


* I can't even take credit for this pun -- I saw it on the DA Facebook page, though using it to describe backmasking was my idea.

** Both songs from Doppelgänger, 1983.

Other album reviews (as posted by the Daniel Amos Facebook page -- I have no idea what else is on these sites):
More Of Dave
The Phantom Tollbooth
Popdose (includes an interview with Terry Taylor)
Into The Son
Examiner.com
Another from Examiner.com
Down The Line Magazine

Music Day

Monday night.

I'm on the Old Christian Music blog, downloading the otherwise-unavailable Vector album Please Stand By (I got Mannequin Virtue a couple weeks ago and was absolutely blown away by it). In scrolling through the sidebar, looking for other artists I like, I saw an entry labeled Painted Orange. I thought that was a cool name, so I clicked the post.

The album artwork was cool too, and an album from 1991 is probably not-irredeemable. I looked them up on YouTube (because I won't even download stuff for free unless I know I'll like it).

The first thirty seconds of the album opener alone sold me on this band. They call it 'electronic,' but it's good electronic. There's melodies and dynamics and, yes, nuances. Plus, the drumming is fantastic -- it just captivated me.

It was so good, I was actually kind of hoping it wouldn't be on the iTunes Store, so I could get the free download with a clear conscience. But it is, so I can't. So now I'm stuck waiting until somebody who loves me very much (there has to be someone...) gets me an iTunes card because all the money in my music budget is now in lockdown on the off-chance White Heart actually comes to Canada in October... but I digress. This album really is one of the best I've heard of the era.

Title: Standing Still
Artist: Painted Orange
Album: Painted Orange
Year: 1991
Label: Star Song
iTunes here; YouTube here.

This particular song is catchy as heck. That quick high-end keyboard motif alone is worth it, and the ethereal vocal layer in the pre-chorus just makes the song. And probably once I own it and have listened to it seven hundred times, I'll have a billion other things I love about it and be disappointed in myself for featuring it now while the beauty of it in my ears was still mostly untapped.

Ah well. We shall learn to love it together, I suppose.

Music Day

This album's been on my wish list for practically forever, but there was always something higher on the priority list (a result of buying your iTunes music in fifteen dollar increments).

Then a few weeks ago, quite by accident, I found myself in a little buy/sell/trade music/memorabilia shop in the back corner of a mall.

After first being sold on the quality of the store (they had a White Heart section! Of course, I already own all the White Heart except Nothing But The Best - Radio Classics, but the fact is they actually had a section for quite possibly one of the greatest unknown bands ever), I looked through all the little tab thingies for artists that I recognised. Of course, any store that carries an unknown band like White Heart also has a Newsboys section and I flipped through it out of curiosity more than anything.

At first I was going to leave this album behind -- after all, it was available on iTunes and I didn't have my money on me, but my dad insisted I buy it and gave me some money.

So I bought it, but having overdosed on Newsboys a few months back, I didn't listen to it right away. In fact, I might still not have listened to it yet except my sister asked to hear it yesterday.

Wow. Just -- wow.

If all the Newsboys you know is the stuff that came after Shine hit it big (you know the '90s radio hits: Joy, WooHoo, Reality, Breakfast, Entertaining Angels, Who?, Believe, plus of course the worship stuff and Million Pieces), you will be absolutely stunned by this album. I actually uttered the words: "Wow -- Newsboys does metal." My mom answered that statement with, "You mean speed metal."

Now, real metalheads will probably dispute that label, but my point is this: you have never, ever heard the Newsboys like this before. Before they became the lynchpin of 'safe and fun' radio, they were apparently a head-banging, hard-rocking, grab-you-by-the-throat-and-drag-you-along-for-the-ride band.

In short, I kind of wish Shine hadn't hit it quite so big and pigeonholed their songwriting formula so much.

Title: Lights Out
Artist: Newsboys
Album: Going Public
Year: 1994
Label: Star Song
iTunes here; YouTube here.

(There were actually three songs in the running today -- Lights Out, which I picked because it's the fastest; Going Public, with its funky groove; and Truth And Consequences... I don't know why, I just like that one. Those were the strongest, but really, When You Called My Name and Real Good Thing are the only weak songs on the entire album.)

Just listen to those guitars... is this not Guitar Hero material? And music needs more drumming like that. Wow.

Music Day

Well, since I was talking about Daniel Amos earlier this week, why not talk about them some more? (However, if the iTunes Store would acquire some Prodigal, I would have featured that instead because I just bought their Just Like Real Life album and HOLY CRAP it's freaking amazing. If you ever see it anywhere, buy it quick. You won't regret it.)

This was the first Daniel Amos song I remember hearing. I use the word 'remember' because my dad owns their self-titled debut on CD and I know I must have heard it a few times when I was younger, but I don't remember any of the material on it, only the cover art. I do seem to recall that it was country. But aside from that, I'd never heard Daniel Amos until this past week. (EDIT: Hold on, I just remembered that's not true... I have heard Shotgun Angel on classicchristian247.com a couple times. However, it's country so I repressed the memory.)

Anyway, I was reading the write-up on the Doppelganger album on the 500 Best Christian Albums blog and was intrigued. Haunting? Creepy? Eerie?

This might be worth looking into.

(You might as well know that I'm the kind of person who will willingly stay up till 4.30 in the morning reading books covering things like human sacrifice, demon possession, mental disorders, and biological warfare on a worldwide scale; then go to bed and sleep deep, long and peacefully. The author's name is Ted Dekker (and he draws a lot of Biblical parallels) if you enjoy that sort of thing.)

So I looked up the album on iTunes and, picking the song that sounded most interesting from the blog post, found myself previewing the following:

Title: Hollow Man
Artist: Daniel Amos
Album: Doppelganger
Year: 1983
Label: Alarma Records & Tapes
iTunes here; YouTube here.

Haunting? Definitely. Creepy? Well, what the song may have lacked, the cover art more than makes up for it. (Something about that wide plastic smile with the hollow pleasant 9-to-5-job eyes and the arm frozen in mid-movement still freaks me out.) Eerie? Spine-chillingly, wonderfully so.

Apparently the musical accompaniment is actually a song (Ghost Of The Heart) from the band's previous record played backwards. I bought that song too, for comparison, and it sounds about right. As odd as the backward drum sounds, it's the backwards bass line that's the most creepy. It growls, but it's an otherworldly growling, and it seems to have a slightly metallic quality to the sound. Of course it's one of my favourite parts of the song.

And the vocals on this song are amazing. They too are beautifully otherworldly as they loop around themselves, swirling, mingling with the indecipherable backward vocals of the other song, a chilling juxtaposition of flowing vocals against the slightly jarring staccato nest of the backward song. The first few times I listened to it (before I cheated and looked up the lyrics), I really kind of enjoyed listening and not quite being able to tell exactly which lyrics were forward and which were backward. The layers and repeats swirling around, plus the reversed vocals (and the fact that the song's actual lyrics tend to match the cadence and pitch of the backward vocals) makes the actual forward-playing English vocals hard to pick out and for some reason I really liked that (though it's worth noting that had this been a secular band, I probably would have had some serious reservations about it prior to Googling the lyrics to check exactly what I was listening to).

What I wouldn't give to see more of this creativity... anywhere. I only wish I had even the tiniest spark of musical understanding that I could attempt to nurture into something remotely close. Alas, all I can do is rely on the distant hope that there is a creative/musical genius out there who will get studio time and exposure without being forced by the CCM machine to kill all his God-given creativity and destroy the remains. (Either that or that the already-existing geniuses will stop believing the lie that they're too old and irrelevant to keep creating great art. As long as there's breath in your lungs, you're not too old to create. Just saying.)

In light of that last paragraph, it's worth noting that this band (unlike certain others *cough* White Heart) is in the process of recording another album -- you can find information on that here.

Music Day

I'll just get this out of the way right now... this falls in the 'awesomely eighties' category. You have been warned.

It's not the stereotypical '80s (or at least not what I think of as stereotypical, which is a big brassy sound laden with sax solos *cough* Kim Boyce *cough*). But the bass groove is definitely '80s awesomeness. One and two and one and two and... (yes, I measure awesomeness in dance counts now. Call it an occupational hazard). Also, the drums have that mid-eighties 'big,' arena-filling sound.

And holy crap, I love how they did the chorus -- that steady, dragging, almost monotone against the the bass groove. It's the best in the second chorus because it leads right into the bridge -- a fiery, passionate, no-holds-barred cry against those who will not stand up and stop the madness, though they say they disagree with it.

Most of the time, the fadeout is my least favourite part of a song (exceptions being Sing Your Freedom and almost anything by David Meece). If not done well, it gets repetitive, plus it's a bugger to choreograph. Every one of my good choreographic pieces that 'runs off the rails,' so to speak, does so during the fadeout. It rarely adds anything to the song that the dance can build on, so my dancers on the staves just wind up randomly jumping around and essentially wasting music until the music gets soft enough that I can run them off the stage (which in itself is a pain in the neck to choreograph).

However, the fadeout on this one is fantastic (from a music fan's perspective -- this is subject to change should I ever choreograph this). The chorus, in its eerie monotone, keeps repeating over the bass and the drums (have I mentioned I love the bass line and the drums in this song?), meanwhile the lead singer keeps crying out for mercy over it. The sharp passion in his voice is such a beautiful opposite to the steady chorus.

Title: The Promise
Artist: The Front
Album: The Front
Year: 1985
Label: Mep/royal Music
iTunes here; YouTube here.