Does Christianity make music worse?

[coloradodem2005]

This is not a slam on christianity. Just something that came from the Alice Cooper thread. It seems like Christian musicians are generally not as good as "secular" musicians. On another note, artists who have a certain image and have always made their music about certain things and they either give up their music or the quality of their music goes down hill.

[shaolinmonkey]

1. I think the over mentioning of Jesus/Christianity does make

music lame. The expousing of Christian ideals in an elegant way, not necessarily.

[leeman67]

2. well, Christian rock is pretty bad, so there

may be something to that.

[vicman]

3. I can never forgive Jesus

for inflicting CREED upon us. :P

[redqueen]

9. Don't blame Jesus for Creed

They're the product of the false church, of that there is no question!

[vicman]

17. Well...

why did he let them sell so damn many records then? My free will just ain't willin'........

[redqueen]

20. No, we have free will

And it's obvious many have turned to the dark side. For example, witness the success of Britney Spears and her ilk.

[Fenris]

4. You read my post. Yes. Yes it does.

[quispquake]

5. Hank Hill said it in reference to a Christian Rock Band...

"You're not making Christianity better, you're making Rock & Roll worse..."

One of the funniest lines better

[slutticus]

6. Ever hear Creed?

'nuff said


:puke:

[eyesroll]

7. I think I offended my fundie officemate once

when I told him about the utter crap eminating from the "Life Music" booth at the county fair.

Seriously -- there are good ways to honor your diety through music. Plenty of classical music is religious in inspiration; plenty of well-written poetry and prose evokes God. But nobody's been able to put it all together.

[NashVegas]

8. No

What makes "christian" music suck, usually, is that the music is less inspired by the divine and crafted for enjoyment, than it was written to worship a divine entity out of obligation and remind us how we are obligated to join the singer in said worship.

16 Horsepower is one of my favorite bands, and I'm nearly an atheist. Nick Cave? His folks were missionaries, and he's written some on the subject.

As I noted a few days ago in the Waterboys thread: they went straight downhill when Mike Scott traded in his muse for a god. While I might reckon the two don't have to be mutually exlusive, there's a world of difference between them.

[vicman]

10. And while we're at it...

Evanesence bites ass REAL HARD. Hank Hill was a prophet...

[LibLabUK]

11. Some does, some doesn't...

Bach, Beethoven, Mozart et al wrote music for the Church. They don't suck.

Christian Rock, something I'm hoping stays firmly over that side of the Atlantic, does suck large.

[vicman]

15. Those guys couldn't have written one note

for Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Reverend Sung Yang Moon (or whatever the hell moniker his holiness goes by these days). Or even Pope John Paul II. It was a different church (not an endorsement), admit it.

[LibLabUK]

19. Yup

"It was a different church (not an endorsement), admit it."

Yep, sure was. Far less accessible for the average person, far more involved in the politics of the day, far more intrusive in the lives of parishoners.

[vicman]

25. Yeah, you're right

Fundies NEVER EVER tell their parishoners what to think, what to do. And Pat Robertson never called for the assasination of Hugo Chavez.... New boss, same as the old boss.

And this is not an attack. I'm applauding your effective use of irony.

[LibLabUK]

35. Hmm

"Pat Robertson"

He's not a Catholic is he?

I was actually talking about the post-Vactican II Roman Catholic Church. In the time of the composers that we were talking about the Church was very different than it is now.

[vicman]

37. Dunno

Is he? Is he not? If he ruled the world would Il POPE be allowed to continue living? Hmm...

[Magrittes Pipe]

12. Two words:

Sam Cooke.

Brilliant Gospel singer, brilliant secular singer.

Aretha as well -- she didn't really have a career in Gospel, but that's where she got her start.

I am hard-pressed to think of any post-rock white artists about whom one can say the same, though. Before rock & roll, there were a lot of great artists who crossed-over between sacred and secular music in country and western -- two huge examples being Hank Williams and the Carter Family.

Ah, the Carter Family. That brings me to the one white post-rock performer who made great records in both Gospel and secular music:

Johhny Fucking Cash.

[vicman]

23. Good music is good music

no matter what the impulse. The artists you mentioned are POLES APART from the rock bands selling kids a load of canned crap in ampitheaters across the USA. Gospel and Blues is the very underpining of all Rock n' Roll. What we're talking about here has no connection at all with the music you're talking about. The artists you've mentioned wouldn't even recognize this crap. They might give a nod if someone told them "it's all about Jesus, man," but they would soon scratch their heads and turn away.

[Magrittes Pipe]

26. You are dead correct.

Nice "Levi Stubb's Tears" sigline, BTW. :hi:


Oh, and edited to add: Welcome to DU!!!

[vicman]

29. Thanks

God Bless Billy Bragg ;)

[bbernardini]

13. I think it's when they try to force the religion in there.

Many times, the music isn't that bad. It's the overly preachy lyrics that turn me off. Neal Morse is a great example of an amazingly talented Christian musician. He left the prog-rock band Spock's Beard because he wanted to focus his musical talent on Christian music. I have to say, I didn't like his first solo outing post-God finding as much as his work with Spock's Beard, but it was still miles better than most Christian music out there. The lyrics were just a little too over-the-top for me. Of course, since the album was about his coming to Christ, that's understandable.

That being said, I've actually heard some very catchy pop-punk kind of tunes on one of the Christian stations on XM (no, they're not owned by Clear Channel, so shut the hell up already). I've even used the "memory" function so I can go back later and find out more about the groups.

[JVS]

14. It never hurt Bach.

"Wachet auf ruft uns die Stimme" is a great song.

[redqueen]

18. As is Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring n/t

[JVS]

21. Here is a page where you can sample some of Bach's hymns

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/bio/b/a/c/bach_js.htm

[pagerbear]

24. Or Handel, Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Wagner....

Shall I go on?

[JVS]

27. What religious music did Wagner compose? I know his wedding march was...

kind of coopted into many weddings, but that was part of an opera, and I doubt was ever intended for religious use.

[pagerbear]

34. OK, not a lot, but there's some

http://users.utu.fi/hansalmi/wagner/choir.html

[bbernardini]

16. Almost forgot...Ricky Skaggs doesn't suck, and he does some Xtian music.

Ricky Skaggs is one of the most talented bluegrass players on the planet. He's also a Christian, and doesn't mind saying so. When I saw him at the Gettysburg Bluegrass Festival this past May, he did some religious tunes, and they were great. The little preaching bits didn't do much for me, but I was so stunned by the speed with which he and his musicians could play, I overlooked it.

[Book Lover]

22. That's cuz it's *corporate*, not christian

C'mon, how many rockin' bands get together because of their love of the Lord?

[flamingyouth]

28. That quote is from King of the Hill

When Bobby gets involved with the hip Christian youth group.

[vicman]

30. And the quote that made me love that show

Dale said, "Don't worry about all this global warming crap. It's a good thing. We'll grow oranges in Alaska."

Hank replied, "Dale, we live in Texas. It's already 103 degrees in the summertime. If it gets one degree hotter, I'm gonna kick your ass!"

[flamingyouth]

31. I love that show

I think it's brilliant, personally. I know a lot of people here don't like it, but I'm a fan.

[dolo amber]

32. Yes

Much in the same way sobriety often does.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

33. Worked for U2, it killed the Waterboys.

[69KV]

51. Waterboys were Christians?

I didn't know that. Their lyrics always sounded to me like they had neopagan leanings.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

69. . Mike (who basically is The Waterboys) is definitely a deist,

and as he does believe in the Christian God, I'd call him a christian. His solo stuff has some pretty explicitly christian songs. The last Waterboys record is pretty christian, to its lyrical detriment.

[Uzybone]

36. I know evanescence sucked

while they were a "christian" band.

[vicman]

38. And now

they don't suck... how?

[Bertha Venation]

39. No.

"It seems like Christian musicians are generally not as good as "secular" musicians." Baloney. As a former aficionado of "contemporary Christian" music, I can tell you that the musicianship of a given individual is not affected one bit by his religiosity. All my faves were a damn sight better musician than I was as a fundy and they're better than I am now. The music of that genre from 20+ years ago was just as good (and some was better, IMO) as similar "secular" music.

And being a Christian doesn't mean you automatically DON'T suck. (Look at heavy-metal band "Stryper." :scared:.) Just because one is "born again" one does not acquire some special God-given talent -- no matter how much one praises God for his musical gifts. You're born with it or you're not born with it, and practice only makes those who are born with it better.

My two cents.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

40. What do you mean by 'good' though? Do you mean 'technical ability'?

Of course, anyone can have technical ability.

[Bertha Venation]

41. not entirely

Technical ability is part of it. But you have to play from the bottom of your soul to be good, IMO. It's not a religious "soul;" it's just that saying "bottom of your heart" isn't deep enough. (Bottom of your liver?) I can't really explain what I feel about this.

I'm not a great musician, but when I'm in front of an audience -- there is absolutely nothing on this earth that I love more than what I am doing at that moment. The times I have performed are a tiny percentage of my life, but (besides the way I was raised as well as getting mental help for the way I was raised) they have gone to define who I am today more than anything else I've ever experienced. If I were performing just because I had the skill and wanted the attention, I would really suck.

[Nevernose]

52. "Soul" is definitely the right word

Although not a musician myself, I come from a family of musicians. My step-father was a pro, and played for every old-school R&B act from Ella Fitzgerald to Joe Williams to Nat Cole. Soul is what he called it when someone played well, the quality that defines a good musician from a technical musician, and yet a quality that is in itself undefinable. How do you describe a feeling? How does one quantify love, or hate, or soul?

I can't tell you what soul is, but I know it when I hear it.

[Bertha Venation]

71. It's not something you CAN quantify.

You just know it. I can't explain it either.

You know who had it in spades? Aaron Copeland. Ray Charles. W.A. Mozart. Just to name three of thousands.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

42. Well, when it comes to choral music

you have more sucky music outside Christianity than inside.

[TrogL]

43. Liturgical Christian music is as good as it comes

The problem is fundies who can't think beyond three chords and start rewriting Christanity looking for an easy lyric. Most of it's heresy plain and simple.

[Spider Jerusalem]

44. When it comes to popular music, generally, yes...

except maybe for U2, who I consider to be sort-of a "Christian" group. But then they use Christian metaphor in their songs without being annoyingly preachy or robotically worshipful, which seems to be the problem of most Christian rock and pop.

[coloradodem2005]

45. What about King's X?

I have heard that the members of this band are Christians but don't succumb to the preachy lyrics.

[GreenPartyVoter]

50. King's X, Creed, Soul Asylum, U2, Lenny Kravitz

There's some great music out there that is spiritual without bonking you on the head with the Bible, ya know?

*humming "Jesus is just all right with me" :D

Would Jesus love a liberal? You bet!
http://www.geocities.com/greenpartyvoter/liberalchristians.htm

[coloradodem2005]

57. You like Creed?

Most people here hate Creed. That is interesting.

[GreenPartyVoter]

72. Hubby likes them. I prefer King's X...the older stuff. :^)

[Cheswick2.0]

46. You should listent to Bortniansky

Oh yeah and "Spirit in the Sky is still one of my favorites.

[Cheswick2.0]

47. Yes, it's a weird magnetic force we have

all music we get near goes bad. It's a plot.

[NightTrain]

48. Depends on what you mean by "Christian music."

If not for African-American gospel music, there would be no blues, no jazz, and no rock 'n' roll. So take it from there!

[whalerider55]

49. sacred steel

well-

are toby keith and charlie daniels country music, or is country music johnny cash and townes van zandt? depends on the definition, which can be very subjective.

to me, some religious music sounds like smarmy crap (e.g. anything i've seen on the 700 club); but some is wonderful and spirited and has a message that transcends form and theology...

Sacred Steel, for instance (Robert Randolph came out of that tradition).

The Million Dollar band- Carl Perkins, Elvis, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis singing old hymns while a tape player was running at sun studios in the 50's- very powerful.

hildegard van bingen- very powerful.

try Zero Church, by the Roches. a very spiritual, non-denominational CD of prayers.

i guess my answer is not necessarily.
whalerider55

[Sufi Marmot]

59. Sacred Steel definitely doesn't suck!

I saw The Campbell Brothers in concert once and they almost cured my agnosticism. Almost... ;-)

Welcome to DU, by the way... :-)

-SM

[DemBones DemBones]

61. Gregorian chant, too.

Welcome to DU! :hi:

[philosophie_en_rose]

53. Replacing "Baby" with "Jesus"

Good music transcends its genre. There are many beautiful religious songs, as well as contemporary songs that mention religion. And, of course, bad music comes in many flavors. However, important content attached to uninteresting, lazy music is especially bad.

Exhibit A: Amy Grant - "Baby, Baby" - Change it to "Jesus, Jesus" and it still sucks. However, its suction increases, because of the heresy of putting someone that the musician allegedly likes (Jesus) into a song that is terrible. Not to mention boring.

[carpetbagger]

54. Modern Christianity deals poorly with implicit themes.

The mass was great fodder for people to compose music for. You could create a world that alluded to the theme of the section, but it seemed to paint a picture rather than give a lecture. A lot of the more artistic and accomplished rock music does the same thing. "Stairway" is certainly on the more obscure end of the impressionist arc, but "Hey Jude" is an indirect statement as well. Since music is usually a direct emotional statement, rather than a statement based in words, a limited scope of lyrical material leads to a limited musical expression.

If you're going to make explicit statements with your music, you damn well better either have a good lyricist or a sympathetic audience. The old hymnists had a gift of words. The depth of their statements still resonate 100, 200, 300 years later. But look in the hymnal at what's been published in the last 40 years. Lyrically, it sucks.

It's my sense that to be defined as "Christian", current music must stick to a small number of story lines, phrases, and constructs. The "born again" experience, and how to get one for yourself, are almost by definition the full scope of what you're "allowed" to write about. You can't construct a universe with that kind of limitation, and so a Christian album will have nothing to raise it up to the level of a secular rock album, for instance, the album on your avatar (Dark Side of the Moon). I could imagine that something like The Final Cut could be constructed, but smarmy statements about the lack of thirst for justice in popular evangelical Christianity aside, I just think there's not enough latitude for the "Christian" artist to move throughout scenes and worlds like Roger Waters did in that album (grand politics, childhood scenes, fantasy, darkness, and forboding, all undergirded, oddly enough, by an implicit but sustaining hope that there are people, including the album's hero Fletcher Waters, who will continue the fight). You certainly won't find the theological depth of a more explicitly religious album like "Aqualung". The audience doesn't want to be challenged.

So you've got a very limited range of expression. Country music (not just the good stuff, but I'm including the Nashville pop as well) actually paints a broader scope of experiences. So if you've only got one or two emotions to paint, and one or two things to talk about, it will be very difficult to set that to music that sounds like it's got some range of expression.

[DemBones DemBones]

62. Good analysis! n/t

[Bake]

55. Well, if you want to learn how to sing real harmony

Listen to Southern Gospel Music. The Stamps, the Blackwoods, even the Gaither Vocal Band. Perfect, absolutely perect harmony. Period.

If you're not interested in singing absolutely good, PERFECT harmony, ignore this post.

Of course, if you can't sing that kind of harmony, put lots of distortion on the tracks, and maybe it'll come out OK.

Bake

[DemBones DemBones]

60. Have you ever seen the Tibetan monks who chant

two notes at once? The chant is a tonal, humming prayer. Years to learn it, intense practice, etc.

To me, that seems akin to the perfect harmony of gospel singers, or to shape note singing. But all of those are contemporary performance of traditional music, wouldn't you say?

I think that Christian music written today is like someone praying in a very self-conscious, "listen-to-me-everybody" manner (or "look-at-me-I'm a Christian") while the religious music of Bach, to take a great example, was addressed to God but was not intended to show Johann Sebastian Bach being a great Christian so much as Bach composing great music to honor God and Christ -- and doing so on commission.

Today's Christian musicians are sincere, presumably, but there's no soul to the music, just some really bad lyrics and vocal gimmicks, IMO.

You don't see Christian visual artists creating great work today, either. They lack a vocabulary of Christian images thanks to the Protestant Reformation and the iconoclasts. I wonder, could today's best musicians and artists produce great Christian work if they were subsidized to do so, as Bach and Michelangelo were?

[jonnyblitz]

56. it makes everything worse. n/t

[skjpm]

58. Bruce Cockburn, Sam Phillips, and T-Bone Burnett

All great, all Christian.

[JSJ]

63. the thing about self-described christer-rockers is...

...they condemn the very music and the lifestyles of those who create the best of it- R&R- that they incessantly try to copy without much success. Look at those bums, Creed, or any number of soulless, clueless sons and daughters of the christer church who couldn't compose an original note or write an original word if their very souls depended on it- so, they'll go to hell for it, too.

[coloradodem2005]

64. You think...

...all the Christian rockers who preach ministry are going to hell? That would be an irony.

[JSJ]

65. straight to eighth circle, i tell you n/t

[FDRrocks]

66. My favorite ska band is christian: Five Iron Frenzy

and I'm not religious at all. So I'd say no.

[coloradodem2005]

67. I like Five Iron.

I don't even really like Ska. I don't even know how religious I am these days. But it seems that many "Christian" bands are not very good. They either lack the musical talent and they go into this because they can sell or because of the lack of scope most of them work with.

[Swamp Rat]

68. Not necessarily

If you're talking about "rock music" then YES it kills it instantly, like the union of matter and anti-matter. Example: Stryper, one of the crappiest bands in human history, killed heavy metal.

On the other hand, if you're talking about "masses" or "cantatas" etc. the answer is NO. That's because it is as much a part of the music as it is the genesis of the musical ideas. Example: Josquin des Pres (c.1450 - 1521), one of the most influential composers of the renaissance period could write for secular and non-secular occasions without compromising the quality of his music.

[name not needed]

70. Even Jesus Hates Creed

:D

[Terran]

73. Given the centuries of great church music, I'd say no.

Modern Christian rock, yes; but on the whole, the artistic impulse that seems to come with Christianity has produced some of the greatest works of music in the world.