KVR Audio

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:22 pm

I'm a Christian too but I cringe at the idea of "Christian music". I think music has it's own "raison d'etre" and using it as a vehicle to promote a particular ideological viewpoint makes it poorer. I'm not saying people shouldn't do it, but I think it's counter-productive to making the best music

xander · Post by **xander** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:28 pm

I wrote and posted a song here a few months back called "I Wanna Be Funk Me". It was meant as a fun little ditty about how shallow some girls I know can be. It had these lyrics:

I wanna be Jesus, I'm wearin my crucifix..."

I wrote that line because I wanted to comment on some Chinerse girls here who wear a crucifix around their neck or as an earing but only as a fashion statement and not because they are Christians.

I asked a Christian friend of mine here at KVR to listen to my song and he hasn't spoken to me since.

The song in my sig, my latest, has the words:

"I must remember to unleash the hound,
to set free the beast from the unhallowed ground..."

It is a song I wrote about a man's deteriorating mental state, yet I have been repeatedly accused of being a 'Satanist" and a "Devil Worshipper" -- even though it had nothing whatsoever to do with anything religious.

I have no idea what happened to Christian tolerance, but it doesn't seem to be that much in evidence any more. People are too quick to judge and to hate, to stereotype and to shun.

nuffink · Post by **nuffink** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:32 pm

...xander wrote:I have no idea what happened to Christian tolerance, but it doesn't seem to be that much in evidence any more.

It died with the fall of the inquisition. Now those guys really knew a thing or two about tolerance.

androidlove · Post by **androidlove** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:39 pm

some of the production on xian alternative has been amazing. i heard a song about a bottle rocket in which the bottle rocket sounded like it was flying around the room. whenever i check out the xian alternative stuff, i imagine the lyrics are about my girl or some superhero

i don't have a belief system. if i were to pick one up to be fashionable, i'd be a sky clad jain

rockstar_not · Post by **rockstar_not** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:45 pm

...xander wrote: I have no idea what happened to Christian tolerance, but it doesn't seem to be that much in evidence any more. People are too quick to judge and to hate, to stereotype and to shun.

Can't argue with you there Alex.

The etymology of the word, Christian, means to be 'like Christ' or 'little Christ', depending on the source you look up.

I agree that history is full of examples of people (myself included) that wear the label, and do a very poor job of fulfilling the description. Chalk it up to human nature. Those that claim Christianity turns one into an angel - unable to exhibit human tendencies, well, those folks are misguided - and they propogate the characterization of Christians as 'those who look down their noses at everyone else'. I've been guilty of it too much to be comfortable to admit. Very un-Christ-like.

-Scott

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:54 pm

No.....I don't think Donnie Christian makes much music....just samples.

TotcProductions · Post by **TotcProductions** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:56 pm

No.....I don't think Donnie Christian makes much music....just samples.

Markleford · Post by **Markleford** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:57 pm

rockstar_not wrote:I also do not believe that someone must be a Christian to appreciate lyrics that come from that standpoint.

Well, mature people at least.

It has received many more votes than I thought that it would - something is resonating and I hope that some of that is the lyrics. They are deeply personal, but I also think that they are universal in nature.

Well the commonality is love and acceptance. For example, it would be fairly easy to change the lyrics of your entry (which I liked a lot) to shape it into a Lillith Fair crowd sort of thing.

People just have these basic needs, whether they're satisfied by another person or their deity of choice.

And I'm not Christian (and in fact find many radical Christians pitiable or deplorable, but it's always the wackos of whatever demographic group that make the news, no?), but Circle of Dust remains one of my favorites.

But Christian pop radio? Don't get me started! It seems when a secular pop act hits it big, all the Christian producers start scrambling and then you hear a sound-alike band on Christian radio 6 months later!

I used to listen a bit when my CD player was dead, just to get some fresh tunage. Still get my weekly dose when riding with one of my co-workers. Listened to a lot of country that way too. The problem with all radio, though, is that they're all playlist driven: same Christian music every hour, same country music every hour...

All in all, it seems that the self-labelled Christian music scene is too incestuous and exclusive, too "in-crowd". However, it does give an act an *immediate* marketing leg up, as some strict donominations preclude their worshippers from listening to anything else (lest they be subjected to temptation, which apparently they're incapable of resisting: faith in Jesus, but no faith in human nature, I guess).

But I agree with most of the sentiment here: you can be a Christian, you can be a musician, but that doesn't make you a Christian musician. Which makes the title of this thread just right!

Hopefully some good connections and ideas will come from this thread before it's inevitably pulled down into the muck. See how fast BONES was on the case?

- m

androidlove · Post by **androidlove** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:02 pm

Markleford wrote:It seems when a secular pop act hits it big, all the Christian producers start scrambling and then you hear a sound-alike band on Christian radio 6 months later!

very true. it also happens in secular music. however, xian musicians seem to be doing it more these days

rpc9943 · Post by **rpc9943** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:03 pm

im a christian but im not a preacher

hey i used to love circle of dust! isnt celldweller huge now?

anyways yup
RONC

Markleford · Post by **Markleford** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:23 pm

rpc9943 wrote:hey i used to love circle of dust! isnt celldweller huge now?

Well, "huge" as in "getting a lot of tracks on TV and movie soundtracks/trailers". That's the kind of success that I'd personally like to achieve: enough money coming in to keep at music without endless touring.

Still not making much of a splash in direct consumer sales, though: gotta have Major Label Payola to be played on radio in these ClearChannel monopoly days of ours!

- m

Stupid American Pig · Post by **Stupid American Pig** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:24 pm

I am Christian, and I make music. I wouldnt call my music Christian music though. I am not evangelical. I will only discuss my faith to those who ask and genuinely wish to know. I respect free will, and dont judge if yer beliefs differ from mine.

rockstar_not · Post by **rockstar_not** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:39 pm

androidlove wrote:
Markleford wrote:It seems when a secular pop act hits it big, all the Christian producers start scrambling and then you hear a sound-alike band on Christian radio 6 months later!
very true. it also happens in secular music. however, xian musicians seem to be doing it more these days

Only those that you hear about. Just as with any other category of music - there is what you hear on the radio (some of which is good) and there are people cranking out some great music which, unless you are connected to the undercurrent, you'll never hear about.

There is a pretty big underground scene with some truly killer bands that I prefer listening to just because the music is better than what I hear on the radio. Some examples: Starflyer 59, the Great Fiction, Over the Rhine, (well two of these actually have kind of 'made it big'), Adam Again, the 77's.

-Scott

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:53 pm

Polyphonic music began as christian music.

Again: POLYPHONIC MUSIC BEGAN AS CHRISTIAN MUSIC.

What this means is that the whole theoretical construct (not just the schoolbook stuff, but vital things like the form of our notational system) began in the catholic church. This is because what the early Christians did together consisted in large part of singing.

Even though these theoretical constructs have a life of their own, just as clockmaking has a life of its own, they both, as a matter of historical record, have their origins in the life of the church. Clocks were the invention of anonymous medieval monks trying to figure out how to measure the dark hours of the day accurately. Notation was the invention of catholic composers trying find a way to coordinate the voices of people singing different lines at the same time.

I say this not as an apologist, but simply because it pisses me off that whenever people talk about "Christianity and music" they always bring up music like Stryper or Creed, and never Ockeghem or Dufay or that giant named Josquin de Prez.

These guys are way, WAY cool.

And really, you don't have to be a christian to like them.

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 3:54 pm

double post, sorry

Any Christians making music here?