Well, as many of you know, I have well expressed my opinion that bluegrass, in general, is not worth listen to. To me, it sounds like a bunch of people who have been out on the ranch, belting out some tune they happened to put empty words with. I don't like the sound. I don't like lots of chromatics. I just don't like it. Does that mean it's bad? No. Yet, why in the world can you put a rockus beat to it, flash strobe-lights around, say it's bluegrass, and agree that it isn't bad? Why would you sing about Jesus, put a beat to it, call it bluegrass, and yet still agree that it's okay? Just because it's talking about Jesus? The words might not be bad if you read them, but when you drown out the words with music so that you can only vaguely hear the words "Jesus rocks" every so often, does that mean it's okay? Does that mean I think it's bad? Not necessarily. In fact, this is only my personal preference. So why am I making a big deal about it? Because I don't think people know what "bad music" is. So, what is bad music? I think that when trying to figure out what "bad music" is, there are several things you must take into account.
1. The culture-In our western culture, we're pretty tame as far as music goes. Ever heard of the missionaries who go to African countries, hear them playing their African drums, are shocked at what they're hearing, and immediately tell them that they must reform their taste of music?
It's cultural. There's absolutely no reason to force those Africans to stop playing those African drums and reform to our western taste of music unless if there's some demonic reason they're playing them.
2. A lot of what is good music and bad music has to do with what the culture thinks is good music and bad music. Using the example from before, if the Africans are playing what would be considered rock music in their country, chances are it wouldn't really be reverent to play for worship.
3. It has a lot to do with how you've grown up. If you've grown up around a classical-music-only group, chances are, you wouldn't think too highly of rock music. During worship, you most likely would feel uncomfortable with having a worship team. If anything, you would feel that you're being irreverent to God in playing such music during worship. On the other hand, if you've grown up around it, you aren't going to feel that you're doing God justice if you worship with hymns only.
4.It has a lot to do with what the words say vs. what the music says. For example, you could have some contemporary worship song that has basically good words (besides the fact that most of them say absolutely nothing), but it could have such loud, obnoxious music that you wouldn't even be able to hear the words. Does an offertory using the words from "Be Still My Soul" fit with rockus, loud music? Absolutely not. The words are calling you to be still and calm and to walk a life of faith, yet what is the music calling you to do? It's calling you to get riled up. The two don't match eachother; therefore, I don't personally see that this would be considered good music.
5. Having grown up with only listening to classical music, I kind of have the view that rock music is mostly associated with a worldly way of living. Of course this is a rather warped view considering there are perfectly sincere Christians who love their rock music. So what makes rock music so bad? One big reason is because most of the words aren't all that great. Also, the music really can cause you to get caught up emotionally in it. I don't know about you all, but I like to be pretty in control of myself. In worship, I don't personally believe that God is calling us to be hugely emotional. I do believe we should be happy, but not because of some outside emotion-producer. I think it should be because we know who we are in Christ. You can be happy and joyful, but that's not the same things as being out of control. I think that much contemporary worship music today stresses on emotion. It makes you feel good because of the music-not because you know who you are in Christ. Just for a quick example, I think of the Newsboy's "Blessed Be the Name of the Lord". First watch the video
Now read the lyrics:
Blessed be Your name In the land that is plentiful Where Your streams of abundance flow Blessed be Your name And blessed be Your name When I'm found in the desert place Though I walk through the wilderness Blessed be your name
CHORUS: Every blessing You pour out I'll Turn back to praise And when the darkness closes in, Lord Still I will say Blessed be the name of the Lord Blessed be Your name Blessed be the name of the Lord Blessed be Your glorious name
Blessed be Your name When the sun's shining down on me When the world's "all as it should be" Blessed be You name And blessed be Your name On the road marked with suffering Though there's pain in the offering Blessed be Your name
CHORUS
You give and take away You give and take away My heart will choose to say Lord, blessed be Your name I will bless Your name
CHORUS
Blessed be the name of the Lord Blessed be Your name Blessed be the name of the Lord Blessed be Your glorious name
You give and take away You give and take away My heart will choose to say Lord, blessed be Your name *Repeat*
Says hardly anything, right? Yet, the song gets you so emotionally worked up that you think you're listening to something great and you really feel "close to God". Of course, this is only my opinion, and I'm not saying there's a "right way" to worship. This is just the way I see it having grown up the way I did.
So, after saying all of that, what is good music? I think it has nothing to do with the label that is put on it (classical, bluegrass, rock music, etc.). And just because something has a beat and a drum doesn't necessarily mean that it's bad. I think you must determine whether something is bad by if the words agree with the music, if the words are saying anything good, if the music is causing you to become so emotional that you're living into an illusion, and if the music/words are causing you to think bad thoughts or do bad things.
24 comments:
Wow, Abb!
I think you might want to re-word it a little because people will read it differently than you intended... I don't think you meant anything that the people who read your blog would disagree with, but it sounds a little different than intended...
I think you both arrive at the same conclusions, but you're providing another, more concrete way of defining music than the traditional "ATI method."
Jolly well put. An excellent resource on the subject is Andrew Pudewa's The Profound Effects of Music on Life.
Wow Abbey, that's a lot of great stuff there! :) Good post.
(Keep the lectures coming...)
That video clip makes me want to join a Bongo Band!
lol, Beth.
Actually, one of the comments on the video from youtube said, "I have a great idea, go deep into Africa and video tape REAL Africans playing drums. I'm so sick of these lost Greatful Dead wanna be "African" drummers. NOTHING beats the real thing."
I was kind of laughing about that one. :D
Another aspect of this that is not often heard of is the fact that we need to honor our parents in the music we play and listen to.
True-but doesn't that fit into the category of listening to things that are making us think/do bad things?
the last of the two videos was more along the lines of contempary worship music than christian rock. for an example of christian rock: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mehEIhcCII4&feature=related
most of christian rock follows the basic principal of this song... a storry of redemption or relating a struggle with sin... contempary worship music is just as you put it... empty and repetitive, emotional and loud...
christian rock as it is called is also verry emotional at times... but it's message and content isn't always so empty.
--tyler
I must admit that I really don't have much experience with either, so I don't really know the difference. Pretty much, in my opinion, both kinds of music don't really go with the words. Also, the music can make you feel like the words are saying something great when they're not actually.
"I love Jesus, yes I do...
I love Jesus, how 'bout you?"
There's so much more to it than that, and when Christians put Christianity into a nut shell like that, I think it give the world the impression that Christianity is some lovey-dovey thing for wimps.
Just finished banging my head and "moshing" to the sounds of your "I love Jesus" song.
Great post Abbey!
Well, as many of you know, I have well expressed my opinion that bluegrass, in general, is not worth listen to. To me, it sounds like a bunch of people who have been out on the ranch, belting out some tune they happened to put empty words with. I don't like the sound.
Agreed.:)
5. Having grown up with only listening to classical music, I kind of have the view that rock music is mostly associated with a worldly way of living.
I agree, and as well most rock music is not particularly overly artistic.
I think you must determine whether something is bad by if the words agree with the music, if the words are saying anything good, if the music is causing you to become so emotional that you're living into an illusion, and if the music/words are causing you to think bad thoughts or do bad things.
This is one way of measuring goodness, as in if the vocals/lyrics are spiritually good for a person. There is also the possibility that vocals/lyrics are presenting non-Christian or anti-Christian perspectives and yet the music is still technically and artistically good or excellent and can therefore be beneficial. I have learned about the need for technical proficiency and creativity from certain well-written and performed secular music.
It is similar with philosophy. Simon Blackburn is perhaps my most quoted author on my thekingpin68 blog and yet he is a secular humanist. I would likely disagree with many of his philosophical conclusions, but he presents various philosophical concepts in a useful intellectual way, and I so I cite him and benefit from his writing.
I left replies to your recent comments.
Russ:)
I agree with your very insightful post.
Music, like art, is basically subjective. One's taste (and one's background, as you pointed out) largely determines whether a person likes it or not.
Much of today's so-called 'Christian' music really bothers me, sometimes almost to the point of becoming righteously angry, because the message in a few of the songs runs completely contrary to the message of the gospel.
When I attended Bob Jones University many years ago, I mentioned to someone that I listened to Christian Rock. They were aghast and shocked, and they said, "There's no such thing!" To them, the term was apparently an oxymoron. In fact, one of my roommates there gave me a book called, "Rock: Making Musical Choices," by Richard Peck...a book which I still own, but which I still have never read.
Shortly after getting saved, I was introduced to Christian Rock, and even back then, I was confused by some of it (like some of the lyrics by Larry Norman, the "Father of Christian Rock," who died recently...I remember some of the words of one of his songs: "Walking backwards down the stairs, trying to get higher..." which sounded like he was on an acid trip or something...and before he got saved, he indeed was heavily into drugs. Another song of his went, "The telephone rang, and I spilled it all over my sweater..." I could go on about him, but you get the point).
Bob Jones University messed me up spiritually, because of a number of things. One thing that I found completely backwards was the music they dictated that you were allowed to listen to. Since getting saved, I have always listened (except for a few brief exceptions) only to Christian music. At Bob Jones University, they did not allow any Contemporary Christian music. They only allowed very old hymns to be listened to. They had their own radio station, and on that station, they would play a lot of classical music. Since I have always been convicted (since getting saved) to only listen to Christian music, it shocked me that an ultra-fundamentalist Christian University would play secular music on their radio station (they also played secular 'band' music). And yet, most of the Christian music that I listened to, they outlawed---to the extent that, if anyone caught me listening to it on the radio, I could be expelled. That was wrong to me, and it was one of the things that messed up my head, as far as spiritual things were concerned.
Most Christian radio stations would not play Larry Norman's music. His heyday was back in the 70's, and even in the 60's, I think. One of his songs, entitled "Deja Vu Medley," had lyrics like this:
"Sipping whiskey from a paper cup
You drown your sorrows 'til you can't stand up.
Take a look at what you've done to yourself
Why don't you put the bottle back on the shelf?
Yellow-fingered from your cigarettes
Your hands are shaking while your body sweats.
Why don't you look into Jesus,
He's got the answer."
Here's some of the lyrics from another of Larry Norman's songs, entitled "Forget the Hexagram." Again, in his day, he was considered the most extreme rebel when it came to Christian music, and many thought that his songs were of the devil.
"Forget your hexagram,
You'll soon feel fine;
Stop looking at the stars;
You don't live under the signs.
Don't mess with gypsies
or have your fortune read;
Keep your table on the floor
and don't you listen to the dead.
You can't hitchhike your way to heaven;
the devil's closed the roads.
You live once and you die once, with no re-incarnate episodes.
You can't hitchhike to heaven
or get there by just being good;
the rules were set down long ago,
when the spikes went in the wood."
Here's the Larry Norman song that sounded to me like he was on an acid trip. The song title is "Ha Ha, World!"
"Ha, ha, world,
Everyday i used to write you a letter.
But you never wrote back
and you never made me feel any better.
Always sitting here
fretting and getting confused;
halfway desperate for a headline of hope in the news;
When the telephone rang,
I spilled it all over my sweater.
The call was for me
and i answered the phone in the kitchen.
But the room was too hot;
I forgot I was cooking my chicken.
I was burning like hell,
but the stove wasn't on;
Then the voice on the line
says the chicken is gone.
The receiver goes dead and it
hums while the plot starts to thicken.
Would i have hung up the phone had I known the whole room would start swaying;
I was instantly cold and I knew why my life wasn't paying.
I had money and fame but my wealth wasn't wise;
What good are the coins on a dead man's eyes?
And the ringing of chimes in my head said it's time to start praying.
I been sitting here praying
and laying up treasures in heaven.
I was home and the front door was locked, when the clock struck eleven.
I heard the bride outside yell millennium;
though the sun was still up,
the twelfth hour has come
The bible says without a vision the people perish."
Possibly Larry Norman's most popular song was "I Wish We'd All Been Ready," written in 1969, which was about the Rapture. DC Talk (my favorite group before they broke up) did a rendition of it many years later.
"Life was filled with guns and war,
and everyone got trampled on the floor.
I wish we'd all been ready.
Children died; the days grew cold;
A piece of bread could buy a bag of gold.
I wish we'd all been ready.
There's no time to change your mind;
The Son has come, and you've been left behind.
A man and wife asleep in bed,
She hears a noise, and turns her head---he's gone.
I wish we'd all been ready.
Two men walking up a hill:
one disappears, and one's left standing still.
I wish we'd all been ready.
There's no time to change your mind;
The Son has come, and you've been left behind.
Life was filled with guns and war,
and everyone got trampled on the floor.
I wish we'd all been ready.
Children died, the days grew cold;
a piece of bread could buy a bag of gold.
I wish we'd all been ready.
There's no time to change your mind;
How could you have been so blind?
The father spoke; the demons dined;
The Son has come and you've been left behind.
You've been left behind.
You've been left behind."
Sorry for all my comments, but I'm on a roll---a blog roll. No, I don't mean a list of blog links; I mean a bad habit of making multiple, successive, orthographic comments on somebody else's blog, due to an intense habit of lucubration. I have a rare condition called 'Chronic Verbosity,' and so far, there is no cure. So please excuse my multiple literary indulgences of a belletristic, epistolary nature.
I used to listen to the group called 'Petra.' One of their songs was entitled, "Killing My Old Man." Now, years ago, your "old man" was slang for your dad. Though they were obviously talking about putting to death the old sin nature, I suspect that their phrasing was to entice unbelievers to listen to their music (for the purpose of witnessing to them through the music, I would suspect). However, such compromises are wrong, IMO.
'Burlap to Cashmere's' song, "Basic Instructions," has always bothered me, because, even though part of the lyrics are:
"For God so much loved the world,
That He gave His one and only Son.
That whoever believeth in Him
Shall not die but live on."
...after singing that and similar things, the bridge/chorus/refrain sounds like (instead of "La, la, la, la, la..."), "Lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie..."
To me, it sounds like everything they've just said (about the gospel) is a lie! So, in my mind, that chorus negates all the truth they have just said in the song! It's almost like Satan has manipulated them to include a falsification of the gospel message in their song.
Maybe its just me, but that really bothers me.
In about 2 or 3 days, I'm going to post a really cute and hilarious video on my blog site, with a similar message to what you have said here in your post. However, the video is going to focus on the popular iPod.
Although, as I said, DC Talk was my favorite group, the lyrics to one of their songs really bothers me. The song is "Jesus is Just Alright."
"Do do do dupe dupe
Do do do dupe
Do do do dupe dupem dupe dopem do
[Check it for me one time]
[Ohhhh, yeah yeah]
(chorus)
Jesus is still alright with me
Jesus is still alright, oh yeah
Jesus is still alright with me
Jesus is still alright
Toby Mac, and the Mac is back no slack
On a DC track that's jacked, beyond comprehension
I believe that I failed to mention that
There's a lack of recognition
When it comes to His position
Cause if Christ can't be crossed over,
Then I'll keep my beat up nova
(repeat chorus 1)
(chorus 2)
I don't care what they may say
I don't care what they may do
I don't care what they may say
Jesus is still alright
Back in place, and I'm all up in your face
With a rhyme that I embrace, like a mother to her child
I'm kickin' it Jesus style
To the ones that think they heard
I did use the "J" word
Cause I ain't too soft to say it
Even if DJ's don't play it
do do do dupe dupem dupe dopem do (3x)
Jesus is still alright
[Oh, I'm hopin' and I'm praying]
Jesus is still alright
Jesus still alright, oh yeah
Jesus is still alright
Jesus is still alright
[oh yeah]
(breakdown)
Jesus is alright, I know He's alright
Jesus is alright, you know He's alright
Jesus is alright, we know He's alright
Jesus is alright, we know He's alright
[Now we come to the pay off]
I'm down with the one that is known as the Son
Of the G to the O to the D never done
With the flow, in the know, on the go like a pro
Not for show cause I ain't in the biz for the dough
Or the me, or the ray, all the dough's gotta stay,
Cause I can't, no I can't, take it home anyway
Never trite when I write cause the Lord is my light
And His Word is my bond so ya know, He's alright
(repeat choruses 1 and 2)
[think about it...]"
There's another song (I don't remember the title, since I've only heard it 2 or 3 times or so) they used to play on Christian radio that had lyrics that went something like:
Jesus came to see what it's like to be human;
Jesus came to see what it's like to hurt;
Jesus came to see what it's like to be born again;
Jesus came to see what it's like to die;
Jesus came to see what it's like to be me.
To me, this is basically blasphemy, or at the very least, false doctrine.
In another song, they say that, even if I was the only person on Earth, Jesus would have died for me. To me, this is putting "me" on a pedestal.
In one of those songs (I don't remember which one), they also say that Jesus died because He can't live without us. Again, blasphemy, or at least false doctrine, which, once again, puts the focus (and the importance) on man, and not on God.
As you may be able to tell, loud, raucous music doesn't bother me as much as blasphemous or even wishy-washy lyrics.
For example, compare the lyrics which I have posted so far to the lyrics of the following song:
"O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home.
Under the shadow of thy throne,
still may we dwell secure;
sufficient is thine arm alone,
and our defense is sure.
Before the hills in order stood,
or earth received her frame,
from everlasting, thou art God,
to endless years the same.
A thousand ages, in thy sight,
are like an evening gone;
short as the watch that ends the night,
before the rising sun.
Time, like an ever rolling stream,
bears all who breathe away;
they fly forgotten, as a dream
dies at the opening day.
O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come;
be thou our guide while life shall last,
and our eternal home."
This hymn, "O God, Our Help In Ages Past," was written by Isaac Watts (1674-1748). Only ponderous metrical psalms were used until this time. To use any words other than the actual words of Scripture would have been considered an insult to God (in sharp contrast to most of today's 'Christian' music!). Challenged by his dad to "write something better for us to sing," Isaac Watts began to create new versions of the psalms. At the age of 25, he published a hymnal titled, "The Psalms of David in the Language of the New Testament." He also wrote other paraphrases of the psalms, such as "Joy To The World," which is based on Psalm 98, and "Jesus Shall Reign," based on Psalm 72.
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