Friday night I went to see a friend of mine perform at Exit-In, prior to the show he sent me a text that read “…don’t miss Joshua!” So with that I made certain I arrived at 9 pm, just in time to catch the opening song of artist Joshua James. I am a huge fan of the murder ballad style of songwriting, well crafted storytelling and haunting sounds. To me this is what Joshua embodies in the music he writes. Aside from Matthew telling me he was excellent, upon hearing the first song I was sold.
What moves me most about an artist is passion. If it oozes out of their heart and up from their gut – I am a believer. As a band they had a unique way of utilizing the drums, all three of them played the kit – simultaneously. Joshua played guitar and handled the hi-hat sounds by using a kick mallet and a tambourine. The other guitarist played the bass drum with a kick and the keyboard player handled a symbol and the toms. A very creative and well crafted 3 piece. Standout songs from the set were “Farmer From the West”, “Lawn Full of Marigolds” and “Coal War”. All proving to be great recordings as well. After the show I picked up his project on vinyl, ‘Build Me This’ – which included a CD of the album as well as a few bonus tracks. I always applaud an artist for taking a risk and having vinyl pressed, especially on the independent level, it proves there are still a healthy amount of vinyl fans out there who don’t just say they love vinyl – but actually purchase records.
Following a brief intermission Matthew Perryman Jones took to the stage. I first heard MPJ at a concert series in downtown Nashville titled “Live on the Green”. I went with my friend Sara who was familiar with his music and thought it’d make for a great night out. The first acts we heard were not memorable to me, I was more concerned with finding water, but as soon as MPJ started performing his music resonated with a sense of familiarity. It was the same passion flowing out across the audience. Since that show I had run into Matthew at various spots around Nashville and about a month ago we realized we had been attending the same parish, just up the street from my home.
He suggested we grab coffee before he left for his next tour. Within that week we met up at a freshly established place in South Nashville. Amongst swirling wind and coffee we swapped stories and spent a few hours connecting. It was very refreshing for me to get to know an honest soul and one who also follows his heart and not the beat of the music industry. I look forward to more conversation and coffee with Matthew as well as new music. Currently on constant rotation is his record titled ‘Swallow the Sea’. If I had to pick three stand-out songs they would be “Motherless Child”, “Save You” and “Feels Like Letting Go” – but really, you need to purchase the entire record. He has released a new EP, ‘The Distance in Between’ which I’ve just purchased and haven’t had the time to fully dissect.
Do stop by their websites, purchase a bit of their music to support and most definitely catch them live if they stop in your town.
For the last two years here in Nashville my Monday nights have consisted of the same small group of fellows getting together to take in dinner at our local watering hole, which most of us walk to. Dinner table conversation flows through the realms of comedy and sincerity, and always includes worthy discussion. Dinner is usually followed by something obscure and void of mainstream – be it episodes of The Twilight Zone or Sherlock Holmes, a documentary or PBS presentation, or mind-bending games of Chess.
Last night we took in the beginning episode of a series of lectures presented at Harvard University. The series is called ‘Justice: with Michael Sandel’. Each episode is split into two parts. Episode one contains “The Moral Side of Murder” and “The Case for Cannibalism”. Below I have pasted these two arguments directly from the Justice website.
PART ONE: THE MORAL SIDE OF MURDER
If you had to choose between (1) killing one person to save the lives of five others and (2) doing nothing even though you knew that five people would die right before your eyes if you did nothing—what would you do? What would be the right thing to do? That’s the hypothetical scenario Professor Michael Sandel uses to launch his course on moral reasoning. After the majority of students votes for killing the one person in order to save the lives of five others, Sandel presents three similar moral conundrums—each one artfully designed to make the decision more difficult. As students stand up to defend their conflicting choices, it becomes clear that the assumptions behind our moral reasoning are often contradictory, and the question of what is right and what is wrong is not always black and white.
PART TWO: THE CASE FOR CANNIBALISM
Sandel introduces the principles of utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, with a famous nineteenth century legal case involving a shipwrecked crew of four. After nineteen days lost at sea, the captain decides to kill the weakest amongst them, the young cabin boy, so that the rest can feed on his blood and body to survive. The case sets up a classroom debate about the moral validity of utilitarianism—and its doctrine that the right thing to do is whatever produces “the greatest good for the greatest number.”
Each episode is an hour in length and well worth taking the time to wrap your head around the arguments presented. I have just finished episode two which is equally intriguing and I’m very excited to take in the rest of these engaging lectures. I encourage you to take these in with a few friends and open up your own round table for discussions. It’s interesting to see which friends would chew on your raw flesh if it meant saving their own hide.
Here is the link to the main website – as well as the first episode.
I am REALLY excited for this to air. My DVR is primed and set to record. This is a 6 night event detailing the monumental moments that made us who we are as a country.
Today I was reminded of how it is the little things that bring me peace and a tinge of joy.
I was busily running a few errands that needed to be completed today. As I turned off West End into a somewhat secluded neighborhood I paused as I saw an elderly man, perhaps around the age of 70, walking up to a tree holding a camera.
He was slowly snapping off pictures of this tree which was stocked full of bright white flowers, rivaling the white of his hair. With each photo he would pull the camera down and look intently at his moment frozen in time, and smile.
Genuine, pure – uninhibited.
It always fills my heart with contentment when I see someone recreationally taking photos. I smile at the simplicity of it. I seem to receive as much joy from it as they do.
As I continued down the street I thought about why he was taking the photos. I like to create my own back stories for scenes played out in front of me that I will never know the actual reality of. Could he be reminiscing about all the years spent around that tree with loved ones? Could he and his wife, who has now been gone for some time, have planted that tree together? Maybe that was her favourite flower and every year when it bloomed they would sit under the tree together and share the moment. Or, perhaps he was out for a walk and was so thankful for another day that he simply wanted to capture a piece of its beauty.
While at ‘St. John the Divine’ in NYC, last month, I picked up a lenten meditation book. While reading this mornings and reflecting I connected and resonated with the author. I thought I’d share it here.
cB
I don’t care what we call it, there’s nothing GOOD about it. Except in God’s economy… which rankles.
I understand (sort of) that Jesus’ humanity meant that he would suffer pain, our pain, human pain. But there’s pain and then there’s PAIN.
Good Friday makes me physically ill. Thoughts of torture curdle my stomach and the vague possibility that I could or might ever be tortured… well, I can’t think about it for long.
So pondering this atrocity, which I must somehow transform into a gift to me and for me, is too much.
Look at the ways we have chosen to torture each other, mentally and physically, and we haven’t been at all horrified.
