tis the season

i originally wrote this last year about this time, but it’s a new blog and i really like what i wrote even if it’s not that good. enjoy.

i watched “a charlie brown christmas” the other night. i can honestly say that it’s not really christmas until you watch that. i had a conversation with some friends about this. you can’t just watch it on a dvd or anything, you have to wait for it come on tv on its own and sit through the commercials and everything. then, and only then, can it really be the christmas season. it’s really funny too. it’s probably the worst animation i’ve seen and most of the voices sound completely unbelievable. but there’s just something about those little oddly proportioned characters, isn’t there? and who can’t relate to charlie brown thinking there’s something completely wrong with him for not getting into the christmas spirit when everyone around him is only interested in money and presents? i think it’s awesome that this thing was made almost forty years ago and it’s still so meaningful. it’s very easy to get caught up in the gifts and stuff. but then there’s that little ray of hope that there’s more to it than that. charlie brown yells in desperation if anyone can tell him what the real meaning of christmas is. then linus gets out in front of everyone and shuts them up by telling them what the real meaning is. right when he’s done with his little speech, there’s this brief moment where it’s completely silent. right then, if only for a fraction of a second and regardless of how they feel at any other time for the rest of their lives, i truly believe that during that silence everyone actually believes that God sent that most special part of himself to become a human baby and completely surprise the entire world. so thanks charles m. shultz. i’m sure he’s already told you “well done good and faithful servant”

song for tonight: “christmas time is here” by vince guaraldi trio

why my wife’s awesome. exhibit A

sunday night we went out to dinner instead of church. mostly because i’m a heathen, but more so because it was the only night we got to spend together that was after she was done with school and before i start the winter camps. anyway, there was a lull in the conversation while we were waiting for our food and i tried to restart the conversation by asking a random question. i couldn’t think of one, but i remembered this line from “fight club.” so i asked her half jokingly, “if you could fight any person, living or dead, who would it be?” hardly a beat goes by and she very seriously says, “gwen stefani.”

song for tonight: “bizarre christmas incident” by ben folds

love my career.

hate my job.

i’m working a crappy retail job because the band is on a semi-break right now, and it’s not like we can still get paid when we don’t play. i move boxes around at see’s candy in the riverside mall. i get paid too much for what i’m doing, but that doesn’t negate the suck factor. it’s just not good for my head space to know that what it really boils down to is that from month to month i’m trusting christians to pay my bills and that’s why i have to work a crappy retail job. also, it’s weird for me and amanda to be on this kind of a schedule with each other. like our usual “normal” pattern is me being in a band. oh well. i’m almost done working there and i’m just being whiny as i come to the end of it. i think i just needed to write stuff down to get some perspective on this. and after writing that last sentence down, i’m reminded of a line from “spinal tap”

songs for tonight: “star of wonder,” “sister winter,” and “only at christmas time” by sufjan stevens. being in the mall i hear a lot of horrible christmas music (kenny g and bing crosby) and then i listen to this in the car ride home and it makes christmas be ok again

on hymms and hippies

oh the hippy songwriters. they’re just too good at what they do. i know the whole folk explosion happened in the 60’s, and that as far as music critics are concerned that’s when the only good music happened, but there’s a lot to be said for some of the artists out there today. it really irks me when i hear music critics say how nobody’s saying anything with their music these days. it’s probably only those old critics anyway.
when i was in fourth grade, i was in a private school and we had bible classes with the obligatory bible class book. in the back of this book was a selection of hymms that i don’t remember if we had to learn all of them or not, but i remember learning one. it was “holy, holy, holy,” and i remember that it was the only hymm in there with words that i, as a 9 year old, could almost understand. almost. for whatever reason that song stayed with me. i could almost understand the words and i liked the melody as much as a nine year old can. it was funny though. because of how i grew up in the church and school that i did, i never got to hear that song outside of the “big grand orchestral” realm. while i love orchestral music, i guess that as i got older i kept wanting to hear this hymm differently than all the other hymms that bookended this song in those 20 minutes before the pastor went to speak. i knew it would never happen though. there’s something about hymms that makes it hard to put outside the box. there’s always the exact same piano part and exact same melody/harmony parts. maybe a different string part, but that’s about it.
sujan stevens is a hippie songwriter. brilliant and maybe less of a hippie than i’m categorizing him as now, but i think he still fits the description. he recently released a set of christmas cd’s that he’s recorded over the past few years. there’s some original material, but it’s mostly traditional christmas songs. there’s only two songs that don’t fit that description though: “amazing grace” and, much to my surprise, “holy, holy, holy.” at first, i wondered at the inclusion of these songs, but while listening it became very clear why these songs are more appropriate than they seem. christmas is the story of the incarnation of God, and “holy x3″ is nothing but the acknowledgement and worship of the Trinity.
i was alone in my car tonight when i heard this version for the first time. i can honestly say that it moved me to tears. i don’t really do that. it was like i was hearing the song for the first time, and for the first time i was feeling the depth and gravity of what i’m sure the original writer intended. if that had song had struck a chord with me at the ignorant age of nine, then hearing this tonight was hearing the fullness of that chord along with the clamor of every instrument created.

if you want to hear this version, click here.

here are the lyrics:

” Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty!
Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee;
Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessèd Trinity!

Holy, holy, holy! All the saints adore Thee,
Casting down their golden crowns around the glassy sea;
Cherubim and seraphim falling down before Thee,
Who was, and is, and evermore shall be.

Holy, holy, holy! though the darkness hide Thee,
Though the eye of sinful man Thy glory may not see;
Only Thou art holy; there is none beside Thee,
Perfect in power, in love, and purity.

Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty!
All Thy works shall praise Thy Name, in earth, and sky, and sea;
Holy, holy, holy; merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessèd Trinity!”

analog vs. digital. an honest debate

after spending some time in a studio recently i’ve gotten reacquainted with the “big recording dilema”: do you record analog or digital? that may not mean much to some people and to most they would never know the difference if they heard it. here’s a little background for the uninformed.
in the old days, you recorded to a two inch wide strip of magnetic tape. it was big, clunky, expensive, hard to use, and sounded terrific. nowadays, you can still record like that, but there’s other options too. the tape has gotten smaller and an entirely new medium arrived that gave people the ability to record straight to a computer. it was easy to use, took up less space than anything before it, and because computer technology keeps advancing has become one of the cheapest ways to record. the catch here is that computers still aren’t fast enough to record every single tidbit of sound that you’re trying to capture, whereas a tape head makes a physical impression on the tape as your recording. as a result of this, the digital file is missing some information in the sound wave. think of it like this:

the red line being a tape sound wave and the blue line being a digital sound wave. so really, you get kind of an approximation of what you’re trying to record. a very good one, but an approximation none the less.
well, so what? why the deuce would i waste my time writing about something that so few people care about or even think is useful? the truth is i just started thinking about the perfect analogy that all this is for a lot of things in life. for example, there’s the itunes music store. this is a digital music store as opposed to what i guess could now be called an analog music store where you actually get to pick up a cd and have it in your hands. it’s a physical impression as opposed to a digital approximation. a lot of people prefer this “real” interaction, myself included. i mean, that doesn’t stop me from downloading music and not having the real thing, but i prefer the real thing. i think if you were to ask people, almost all would prefer the real thing.
so why, gentlemen (myself included), do we choose a digital approximation of a woman instead of the real thing? why is this so hard for us? i think if you were to ask men what they preferred almost all of them would say they preferred real thing. about a month ago i had to confess to my wife that i was choosing a digital approximation over a physical impression with her. it wasn’t easy, and we’re both in a better place with each other now, but i still feel like i need to get all that off my chest. this is a very big real struggle for almost every man, married or not. when you’re single, you think that as soon as analog becomes a reality for you, digital becomes a thing of the past. when you’re married, you realize that analog is a lot harder to use. there’s reaction between two things that each behave differently as opposed to a singular action. digital was so much easier. sure it’s not as good, but it worked. it’s easy to go back to what’s familiar. it’s easy to not want to work at things to make them the best they could be. we’re all guilty of this and not just when it comes to this issue. i’m doing my best, and with God’s help i won’t compromise on digital convenience.

song for the day: “new round” by beck. i got to hear the newest album because someone else in this coffee shop has it