Forsaking dignity for grandeur: Billie Holiday, Mahalia Jackson, and the prophetic imagination

So in this time of great busy-ness, my good friend Carlo has responded to the need and provided us with another excellent post. This one extends a little further on the theme he began with in his Johnny Cash post: 20th century American music and the Old Testament prophetic imagination. Enjoy.
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Forsaking dignity for grandeur: [...]

Jesus, the Prisoner: The necessities of Johnny Cash

Here’s guest contribution #2. I swear, a guest authorship page is coming soon. Pray, be patient. 
This one’s from my good friend Carlo, who’s a Johnny Cash nut. Actually, he’s kinda a nut for any music that speaks apocalyptically and prophetically about the human condition. If it’s gritty, he’s probably groovin’. I believe a prerequisite for whether a [...]

My Arcade Fire penance

Today is the one week anniversary of my colossal mistake of missing Arcade Fire’s Columbus, Ohio, show. Stupid legal education and its time commitments. And I had just started to “get” this band. “Antichrist Television Blues”? It’s brilliant! Anyway, this is my penance, it’s two-part:
Live version of Arcade Fire’s “No Cars Go.”

And, here’s [...]

A couple things about Bob Dylan

For the Bob Dylan nuts out there, I’ll give you some info to which you’re probably hip. November 21, 2007, is the date that a new biopic of the enigmatic songwriter enters into a limited release here in the U.S. It’s called I’m Not There, named after a highly regarded unpublished track Dylan wrote that reportedly [...]

Deep in the belly of a whale: A quick repreive from the Flood

Drowning, drowning, drowning. It’s a busy week here in LawSchool Land. I’m in the middle of summing up each class to this point, and realizing that I’ve read a lot of stuff in four weeks.I’ve got some good junk coming your way this week, you’ll just have to be patient. I’ll try to get what I [...]

Why? Because I couldn’t NOT post it!!

Here’s a band I’m really really starting to dig.
It’s Arcade Fire, performing the title track off of their most recent album, Neon Bible, from inside an elevator.
So, I know all kinds of bands have used all kinds of crazy things for instrumentation. But ripping pages out of a magazine as percussion!? Oh, sweet . . [...]

The Not-So-New Pornographers: Why I Believe Most Christian Music Should Be Rated XXX

I love Kurt Vonnegut. Even though material in his books oftentimes soars over my head, I usually catch insights from him that just floor me. His writing style is one that presents certain truths in a way that is fresh, strange, and undeniable. For instance, In his book Breakfast of Champions, his main character, science fiction writer [...]

Is This Where Soul Meets Body?

Well, let’s do something a little less ambitious than that last post. I wanted to air out some ideas about political campaigning and ended up wanting to make a call-to-arms manifesto against the entire system. This time, let’s go with something a little safer. Something less ambitious, something a little smaller, more tame, and less [...]