Read “Should You Return” by Copeland on Genius.
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THERE’S NOTHING LEFT TO DO BUT WASTE MY TIME. A Copeland song isn’t merely recorded. It’s a composed piece of music that has layers of production. Production is overseen by the frontman, singer, and multi-instrumentalist, Aaron Marsh. Copeland’s fourth album, You Are My Sunshine, seems to be the biggest shift in the band’s sound. Bryan Laurenson‘s lead guitars are a layer to the band’s keyboard/ synthesizer sound. Listeners won’t find the 1940 Jimmie Davis/Charlie Mitchell song on the album. The song does appear on their Grey Man EP, however. The theme of the lyrics of “You Are My Sunshine,” though–“you make me happy when skies are grey” and “please don’t take my sunshine away”–can be felt at times throughout Copeland’s fourth album, as if the short old-time country song is a ghost haunting the album. “Should You Return,” like every track on the album, has a hypnotizing effect, pulling the listener into their own thoughts rather than thinking about the music itself. I had to focus very hard to read the lyrics of “Should You Return” because my mind wandered, and I couldn’t help but hum the song. But, the experience of reading only the lyrics (after a few attempts of being lulled by the melody of the song), left me sad. The question posed by the song is left unanswered.BUT IF YOU’RE UNHAPPY STILL, I WILL BE WAITING ON A LINE. Copeland released official music videos for most of the songs on You Are My Sunshine. Most of them are as banal as the mood you have to be in to enjoy this album. The video for “Should You Return” focuses on guitarist Bryan Laurenson. In the video, he has lost his girlfriend, and the story is told using stop-motion animation with photographs as well as actual video. At the end of the video, Laurenson falls off a cliff only to wake up to discover that the ex-girlfriend is actually looking at an old photo album. She sees Laurenson reaching for her, but she promptly shuts the cover and walks away. The lyrics depict loss. The singer is complete but for one piece he’s missing, the one he loves. Yet, the one he loves is toxic for him: “a love to make it hurt.” The song finds the singer at a point of loss in which he wishes for something new to have and then to lose as if to feel the pain even deeper. Yet, the song ends “hanging on a line, should [the listener] return.” The music makes us believe that maybe there will be a Hollywood ending. Maybe, like Scarlet from Gone with the Wind, we can say, “After all, tomorrow is another day.” The music of Copeland often deals with the bleak. But, other than Blushing and parts of Eat, Sleep, Repeat, the band can make us leave the record feeling rejuvenated. Ultimately, we have to heal from our losses. We can’t hang on the line forever. But “Should You Return” is a song to wallow in the pain for a bit.
Read “Should You Return” by Copeland on Genius. -
Ontario-based Christian rapper Manafest signed to BEC Recordings and Tooth & Nail’s Hip-Hop imprint Uprok Records in 2005. In 2008, Mananfest released his third album, Citizens Activ, which was surprisingly successful in Japan. His fifth album, 2010’s The Chase, saw the rapper fully embracing rap-rock. The album was preceded by Avalanche – No Plan B EP. The two songs “Avalanche” and “No Plan B” contained remixes and alternate versions, including a version of “No Plan B” featuring Japanese metal vocalist of Crossfaith, Kenta Koie contributing a verse to the song. The video for the song also features Koie.
FACE MYSELF OR GET TAKEN OUT. Christopher Scott Greenwood, the future Christian rapper Manafest suffered many setbacks in his early life. When he was five, his father committed suicide. He became a Christian after attending a summer camp. When he was about 14, he dreamed of becoming a professional skateboarder, but in 1998, he suffered an injury that stopped that dream. After the injury, Greenwood turned to music, forming a rap duo Under One King with fellow rapper Jusachyl. Greenwood used the moniker Speedy until he began producing his own music independently in 2000 as Manafest. After gaining some attention from the Canadian Gospel Music Association and from Thousand Foot Krutch’s Trevor McNevan who heard his first independent album, Manafest signed to Uprok and BEC Recordings. Manafest continues to skate, though not professionally. “No Plan B” is a concept from the rapper’s skating days, when he talked about executing tricks–being fully committed to the trick. It became a metaphor for life. There was no alternative but to follow through with the original plan. Some experts say that having no backup plans makes you more committed to your goals. Of course, Manafest had to make a “Plan B” when his skating career ended. Maybe, the answer is making a Plan B when Plan A is completely unfeasible.
SPIN 180 FOR THE WIN. Crossfaith was formed in Osaka, Japan, in 2006 as a Linkin Park cover band. Their aggressive rap-rock featured Kenta Koie developing unclean vocals, which are heard on the EP version of Manafest’s “No Plan B” and presumably he contributes the scream to the end of the chorus on the album cut as well as he is showing screaming the vocals in the video and the voice sounds similar enough to Koi. Crossfaith opened for several bands on Japanese legs of international tours, such as The Used, Hatebreed, Machine Head, Memphis May Fire, and August Burns Red. In 2011, Crossfaith released their debut album, The Dream, the Space, in America, which led to international fame. The band has toured with Underoath in Japan and performed in Japan’s iteration of Ozz Fest. They were part of The Van’s Warped Tour in America and opened for bands like Bring Me the Horizon and Of Mice and Men on their international tours in Europe and Australia. -
In 2000, DC Talk announced their intermission, a hiatus that has outlasted their 15-year existence. According to Toby McKeehan, better known by the stage name TobyMac, Michael Tait and Kevin Max wanted to record solo projects and McKeehan wanted to pursue DC Talk. But then McKeehan was approached about recording the theme song for a film called Extreme Days. McKeehan crafted his debut solo record with that single, the genre-bending Momentum. The album was filled with hip-hop, rap-core, soul, and funk. Eventually gold-certified, Momentum started the career of the reluctant solo artist in DC Talk who became the most commercially successful of the trio.
SOMETIMES I FEEL GOD IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT. In 1984, Rockwell released his number 2 Billboard Hot 100 single “Somebody’s Watching Me.” Rockwell, born Kennedy Gordy, wrote the track when his father, founder and CEO of Motown Records Berry Gordy, challenged him to write a chart-topping hit. The one-hit-wonder has often been misattributed to the artist who sang the chorus, Michael Jackson, a childhood friend of Kennedy’s. Rockwell’s hit talks about not being able to have a private life, and the video visualizes the lyrics with unnerving point-of-view camera angles. The song has entered novelty status thanks to the funny lyrics about being “in the shower . . . afraid to wash [his] hair.” It’s even become a staple on Halloween playlists. In 2001, TobyMac interloped the chorus of Rockwell’s hit on Momentum for the Christian Hit Radio single “Somebody’s Watching.” Rather than focusing on the creepy feeling of being watched by a stranger, McKeehan focuses the song on the watchful protection of God, contrasted to the “haters” who are focused on McKeehan’s failure.
I’M FEELING DADDY IN THE AIR TONIGHT. Rather than Michael Jackson singing the chorus, Joanna Valencia sings on TobyMac’s “Somebody’s Watching” as well as several other tracks on Momentum. Her vocals create a kind of tonal consistency on the frenetic mashup of genres on McKeehan’s debut. The album was a major hit on Christian radio, with six singles spread between Christian Hit Radio and Christian Rock radio. “Somebody’s Watching” appeared on DC Talk’s Solo EP ahead of the band releasing their solo projects as a previewing of the new musical directions the band members were taking and it was also included on Wow Hits 2002. “Somebody’s Watching” began the vocal “TobyMac” introduction tag that appeared on many of the artist’s solo works and guest appearances. The tag was to the Christian market what the “Jason Derulo” vocal tag was to the pop market in the late ‘00s. TobyMac is a charismatic personality who continued a musical empire built by DC Talk. It’s a fine line between appropriate confidence and arrogance. On the one hand, he’s a truly talented artist–from the live energy to musical crafting in multiple genres. A lifelong proponent of racial reconciliation, his music envisions the kingdom of heaven through the eyes of all ethnicities. But it’s not only the ego that feels problematic in a relisten. “Somebody’s Watching” feels like a spiritual flex–no, make that a spiritual webcam exhibition. “Watch baby, watch baby” McKeehan raps. “See, I’m down with the king, so I got it like that” he adds to Valencia’s chorus. This is quite different from Maxwell’s “I have no privacy.” Many like me when I was growing up found the way that McKeehan sings about God watching him a bit terrifying. Certainly, we weren’t saying to God, “Watch baby, watch baby.” But with all the problematic lyrics, I found myself unironically enjoying TobyMac’s Momentum. But I’m a little ashamed of that. Please don’t watch me closely.
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In August 2010, Katy Perry released her seminal album Teenage Dream. While the former CCM singer had several big hits from her rebranded debut album, One of the Boys, it was Teenage Dream that solidified Perry in pop music history as the album tied with Michael Jackson’s Bad for having the most number 1 Billboard’s Hot 100. Teenage Dream wasn’t exactly a concept album, but many of the songs involved fantasy–romantic and sexual. But Teenage Dream wasn’t the only adolescent themed album of 2010. In April, Secret & Whisper released their sophomore record on Tooth & Nail, Teenage Fantasy. Unlike Katy Perry’s sophomore record, Secret & Whisper faded into obscurity after releasing their follow-up to Great White Whale. After one single, “Warrior” (Southern Arrowwood), was heard on Christian Rock radio, the band announced an indefinite hiatus in July 2011.TONIGHT I TRY TO STAY AWAY FROM YOU, LADY OF NORTHERN STAR. Listening to Teenage Fantasy, listeners would be hard-pressed to find anything that would warrant the band to be played on Christian Rock radio. Secret & Whisper being signed to Tooth & Nail Records included the band in the Christian Rock scene. While at least some of the band members held at least partial Christian beliefs, lead singer and songwriter Charles Furney (later known as Charles Finn) held extra-biblical beliefs of ghosts and the supernatural, which he talks about in an interview with Frank Jenks, explaining the lyrics from the band’s debut album, Great White Whale. On Teenage Fantasy, Charles alludes to Native American spirituality in “Warrior” (Southern Arrowood) and animism on most of the other tracks, including today’s song, “Youth Cats.” Unsurprisingly, the album was banned from some Christian retailers due to the band’s lyrics. Furthermore, when the band announced the title of their sophomore album, some fans thought that the band was hinting at something perverted. Charles dispelled these rumors in a MySpace blog post. He wrote: “For all of you that have put a pervy twist on the name Teenage Fantasy, all [I] can say is gross. But what can you expect these days, aren[’]t we all kind of idiots?” (italics supplied).
THE YOUNGER CATS HAVE COME TO TEAR AWAY. Secret & Whisper’s Teenage Fantasy opens with the song “Youth Cats.” Musically, the band stays within the genre of melodic speed metal they established on their debut record, Great White Whale. While the lyrics are sparse on Great White Whale, the lyrics on Teenage Fantasy are immature. It’s an adult reflecting on his teenage fantasies. These fantasies are not sexual, at least mostly, but the fantasy of the album feels more like fantasy as a literary or film genre. “Youth Cats” is a song about “The Lady of Northern Star,” also known as “The lady of miracles” who “commands the river.” The image in the song is about a middle-aged woman who is probably single and who may be openly a shaman or at least is rumored to be a witch. The rumors pique the young speaker’s interest, so he decides to spy on her one night, and that night he happens to see her bathing nude in the river. The speaker’s tone is one of awe and fascination. He feels this shaman has unlocked secrets of the earth through her rituals. Then, who are the youth cats? When Charles Finn sings “The younger cats have come to tear away / Tonight they hunt their prey and it is you,” perhaps he’s alluding to the new ideas and youth who have no interest in shamanism. Maybe it’s the new ideas that don’t listen to the earth and actively try to rid society of the magic. Maybe the song is a lament about how youth culture erodes society from traditions that link us to our history.
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Following up P.O.D.’s 2003 self-titled album, Testify brings the band both back to their hard rock and reggae, while going deeper into rap rock. The video for the album’s lead single, “Goodbye for Now” topped MTV’s Total Request Live. It was the band’s fourth video to top the countdown, the most by a single artist until that point. Rather than a hard rock single as all P.O.D. albums had been led with until that point, “Goodbye for Now” was a down-tempo, moody Hip-Hop track featuring an act that co-producer Glen Ballard had signed to his soon-to-be-defunct record label, Java Records. Ballard suggested that Katy Perry at the end of the P.O.D. track. “Goodbye for Now” was slightly more successful than the singles from Payable on Death, but the band failed to follow up their lead single. It was also the band’s last charting hit on non-Christian charts.
WE TORE THIS ROOF OFF THIS MOTHER; NOW IT’S TIME TO BLOW. P.O.D. departs from Howard Benson and instead works with Glen Ballard on Testify, the band’s sixth studio record, yet the album feels more like a natural follow-up to Satellite. Besides “Goodbye for Now,” Testify packs an energy that their previous record lacked. From the reggae Matisyahu duet opener, “Roots in Stereo” to the heavy closer “Mark My Words,” Testify takes a few time-outs, but it’s mostly an intense ride. The Psycho Realm’s Sick Jacken and Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. contribute colorful Gangsta Rap lyrics to the song “On the Grind.” The album was also supposed to feature Korn’s Johnathan Davis was supposed to record a part on “Mistakes & Glories,” but was unable to meet the album’s schedule due to touring. Matisyahu also contributes to “Strength of My Life” and Jacken also contributes to “Mark My Words.” The album’s second single, “Lights Out” was only a minor hit, but it feels like the old P.O.D. is back. It’s a mature, fleshed-out version of “Checkin’ Levels” from The Fundamental Elements of South Town. A major criticism of the Jason Truby era of P.O.D. is that the guitarist couldn’t keep up with the band’s hardcore sound, but in “Lights Out,” Truby earns his strings.
WE LYRICAL MURDERIN’ LIKE WE CRIMINALS. P.O.D.’s fifth, self-titled album, was a kind of reintroduction to the band with a new guitarist. Lead singer Sonny Sandoval seemed to be digging into the essence of what made the band P.O.D. But the complete change in sound wasn’t a successful effort. Testify, on the other hand, is like Sandoval’s thesis statement. It’s an overtly Christian album, but it’s also tales from the streets. It’s inter-faith, featuring Jewish artist Matisyahu. It’s collaborative, granting non-Christian artists verses. But, perhaps, it was a bit too preachy from a faith-based band that had reached its end on the hit parade. Then again, the music scene was changing in 2006 when the P.O.D. released Testify. Looking at Modern Rock/Alternative Airplay charts from the early ‘00s to mid-‘00s it’s interesting to note the fall of Nu Metal as the chart started to favor pop punk and Emo. We’d see more faith-based acts on the charts from Flyleaf to Anberlin to Underoath, but as for P.O.D., it was “Goodbye for Now.”
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The Vanguard Room is a recording studio in Lakeland, Florida, run by Aaron Marsh, best known for his work with Copeland. Besides recording Copeland, Marsh has recorded and produced artists such as Anberlin, This Wild Life, Anchor & Braille, The Myriad, and many others. In 2019, The Vanguard Room released the album, A Lakeland Christmas, Vol. 1, a project funded by Kickstarter. The ten-track record features local artists from Lakeland covering Christmas tunes. None of the artists featured have a large streaming following, but the Aaron-Marsh-produced record is beautiful nonetheless. Today, we’ll look at the John Denver song “Christmas for Cowboys” performed by Dan Sharrett of nora’s breakfast club, originally from Denver’s Rocky Mountain Christmas album.
BACK IN THE CITY, THEY’VE GOT DIFFERENT WAYS–FOOTBALL, EGGNOG, AND CHRISTMAS PARADES. Starting in about October, I started listening to Spotify’s country playlists. It’s a genre that I have to be in the mood for, and I have to be prepared to skip up to five songs in a row for annoying twangy voices or cringy lyrics. I started listening to the Decades section and found that especially for the artists featured in the ‘70s playlist I would more likely consider Folk, like Gordon Lightfoot and John Denver, or Southern Rock, like The Charlie Daniels Band, or even just light pop like Anne Murray or Olivia Newton-John. John Denver’s love for place–not just West Virginia but especially Colorado, for which the artist born Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr. created his stage name after the state’s capital–and his themes in songs like “Thank God I’m a Country Boy,” group the singer with the country tradition. The title “Christmas for Cowboys” could center the singer in Country music, except he’s missing the signature twang to make him a real country star. I’d almost call the song a novelty holiday song, except the music is beautiful, and Denver’s vocal delivery of the tune is earnest. Rather than feeling the Country cliché, we empathize with the lonely cowboys in the song; their lonely existence on the plains become our own, especially for those of us who have ever had to spend a Christmas alone.
THE WIND SINGS A HYMN AS WE BOW DOWN AND PRAY. But again, we’re not listening to John Denver. Instead, we’re listening to Dan Sharrett of nora’s breakfast club, a band with only 13 streams a month. The band released two albums, starting with Soliloquy in 1996. The band stayed local, but future members of Anberlin and Copeland heard the band in the small Central Florida scene. Briefly listening to the band’s 2015 EP Watch the Stars Burn feels like an elevated local band thanks to Aaron Marsh’s Vanguard Room recording and production. In fact, Marsh seems to put his touch on every song on A Lakeland Christmas, Vol. 1. I almost expect to hear Marsh himself singing in Emilie Weiss’s “Let It Snow.” The droning, melancholy “Little Drummer Boy” sounds like an out-of-control Copeland arrangement. But Marsh keeps the current Copeland sound of electronics at bay until the final track, “The Ice Storm,” his own song. While there’s much to love on this album, it was “Christmas for Cowboys” that first captured my attention when it came up on shuffle in my Apple Music library a few years ago. It’s not the most recognizable song on the album, but somehow the guitar riff is stronger than Tim Steiner’s “Santa Tell Me,” Van Plating’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” or even Dan and Nick Rivera’s “Last Christmas.” So, wherever you find yourself this Christmas, in the city, on the range, or anywhere between, I wish you a merry Christmas.
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“I~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~I. Don’t want a lot for Christmas.” *struggles to change the radio dial amid gridlocked holiday traffic* “There’s just one thing I need” *hurry up with my damn latte! I think I’m going to die. Why the hell is Starbucks playing Christmas music in mid-October?* “I don’t care about the presents” *internal Elaine monologue ‘I think I’m going to die in this department store. Ma’am, why must you spray the perfume so close to my face. I can’t breathe! What if the earth begins to shake and we’re stuck in here forever underneath mannequins and holiday shoppers and that damn Mariah Carey song stuck on repeat?’* “Underneath the Christmas tree” “No” *raising a strict finger to students who should be studying in the back* “Not before Thanksgiving.” “I just want you for my own/ More than you could ever know.” Every year, Christmas music gets earlier and earlier. “Make my dreams come true.” Corporate America wants to put us in credit card debt. “All I want for Christmas” Call me Scrooge, but I’d like to go back to childhood when Christmases were magical. “Is” If only we could go back in time to say, 199~ “You~~~~~~~~~” That’s it! 1992! before this song ruled the world.
Meme from two years ago. I DON’T NEED TO HANG MY STOCKING. Am I being too harsh on the holiday classic? Critics loved the song when it came out. If I were writing a blog in 1994, maybe I would have appreciated the musical elements–the throwback to old Christmas songs, the unique chords, the imitation of a wind-up Christmas music box–but in 2021, I’m too desensitized to whatever musical point Carey was trying to make. To me, Christmas music, the more traditional the better. There is something so much more magical about a small church singing on a snowy evening hymn from the 1800s than Bing Crosby singing in the ’40s. When I was growing up, several CCM Christmas albums captured an old-time Christmas–whether it was Michael W. Smith‘s Christmastime or the artists who sang on the City on a Hill Christmas project. There was something about the 20th-century Christmas songs that just sounded like shopping. And they were done to death–disco, punk, soul, pick a genre. My old soul, though, has to cope with a commercialized holiday, and at the center of the commercialized holiday rests “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” the retail worker’s nightmare adapted into a song.ALL THE LIGHTS ARE SHINING EVERYWHERE. It’s been a hard year and the holidays barely made an impact on me. Time moved so quickly that it felt like it was just yesterday that I was sweating in August heat and today it’s Christmas Eve. The school year was also a blur. Being short-staffed kept my coworkers and me constantly planning, teaching, grading, writing comments, and completing administrative tasks. Weekends were busy as I had taken on a little extra work and I spent the time with my partner who was completing his senior year of medical school. My personal time was split between blogging and following a fitness plan. And I also got sick more times this year since I stopped wearing a mask at the beginning of the year. I finally caught COVID in August, and I’m getting over my third cold (or maybe sinus infection) of the year. I also spent a lot of time (and money) preparing for a vacation this coming January to London. Now the semester has ended and I have free time. I furiously bought presents, and half-heartedly set up my Charlie Brown tree. Around November I started listening to Christmas music, but not exclusively, mostly on Spotify. Somehow the spirit of Christmas hasn’t settled in yet. I’ve been blogging about Christmas songs since the first week of December, but the season’s magic feels to have worn off on my mid-thirties heart. So, today, I’m posting the original Mariah Carey version of “All I Want for Christmas Is You” because I’m not sick of it yet. I feel like I didn’t have a chance to get sick of it. I lived under my headphones this year while working in the office. I didn’t play Christmas music in class until the last days and I mostly controlled the music. Maybe, if the years go like this again, I can preserve the magic of the song. But I certainly don’t want to feel this rushed again. If years continue like this, I’m going to wake up and be old sooner than I think. -
Hark! An unexpected gift has appeared under the tree this season, and it’s a gift for us all to Cher. That’s right, this year Cher has released Christmas, a combination of jukebox Christmas favorites (and non-Christmas songs made festive) and new jingly jams. Unless you’re a Jack McFarland-level fan of the corset-wearing pop star, you probably haven’t thought about the 77-year-old star since, well, 1998 when the contralto brought autotuning to the mainstream with her mega comeback hit “Believe.” For millennials like me, it was my first introduction to the singer. It was also a rarity for a singer popular during my parents’ generation to score a number-one hit on pop radio. And while Cher’s latest Christmas single, “DJ Play a Christmas Song,” has not yet hit Billboard’s Hot 100–it’s peaked at 115 so far–the song has topped Billboard‘s Adult Contemporary chart.
THAT’S THE ONLY THING I WANT THIS YEAR. Cher’s Christmas is a little anti-climactic after being frontloaded with its banger “DJ Play a Christmas Song.” Duets with Stevie Wonder, Cyndi Lauper, Darlene Love, and Michael Bublé don’t exceed the original versions in the way that Dolly Parton’s latest album, a rock covers album, doesn’t add much to the artists she duets with. But if there were a second track to follow up “DJ,” it would have to be the duet with Tyga, “Drop Top Sleigh Ride,” which has the line “I’m only a jingle bell away.” I first learned about Cher’s Christmas when the hosts of Good Christian Fun discussed new holiday albums of the year. When they played a preview of the album, I wanted to dismiss it as purely kitsch, and certainly “Drop Top Sleigh Ride” is pure kitsch. I haven’t revisited the song since the podcast, and I have a feeling that listening to the song ironically will get old soon. However, after Kevin T. Porter nominated the song “DJ Play a Christmas Song” as the best Christmas song on the next week’s episode, the song started getting stuck in my head. It was marketed to me on Instagram a few days later, and now it’s a tune I will never get out of my head.
IT’S COLD OUTSIDE, BUT IT’S WARM IN HERE. Cher has been performing “DJ Play a Christmas Song” on many talk shows this holiday season. Kelly Clarkson loved the song so much that she covered it in her Kellyoke series. While I think that Clarkson’s version sounds more like a song that I would listen to under normal circumstances, even if the lyrics feel a little cheesy; it’s Cher’s voice that solidifies the catchiness of the song. It’s that private moment after drinking too much coffee you have to mimic her voice to get the full effect. And by mimicking Cher’s voice I begin to channel her confidence. Could I be starting to understand why she’s a gay icon when I didn’t get it until now? But what really makes the hit infectious is the not-so-subtle call back to “Believe.” Both songs heavily use autotune, but the added bells and cliché holiday chord progression make “DJ Play a Christmas Song” sound like it’s the Christmas version of “Believe.” The two songs also share a producer–Mark Taylor. I’m not sure if we’ll be returning to this song next year. Is it just a holiday novelty hit? Or will the warm feelings of dancing the night away in a discotheque become a holiday standard? This year, I’m caring so much less about the musical cred and just focusing on what’s, um, interesting.
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In 1944 or 1945, Mel Tormé and Robert Wells wrote the song “Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire.” Tormé talks about writing the song on a hot summer’s day as a list of cold weather fantasies he and Wells, his songwriting partner, brainstormed to think cool thoughts. The Nat King Cole Trio first recorded the song in June 1946, under “The Christmas Song” (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire). The group re-recorded the song in August, which became a hit on pop and R&B radio. Nat “King” Cole, as a solo artist, would record the song two more times throughout his career. Cole’s 1961 version, his fourth and final, is the version most played on radio and streamed today. That version is also in the Library of Congress to be preserved by the United States National Recording Registry.
SO, I’M OFFERING THIS SIMPLE PHRASE. On a 2021 holiday episode of Hit Parade, host Chris Molaphany talks about the phenomenon of classic hit-makers becoming reduced to their holiday legacies in what he nicknames “Chestnut Roasters.” Looking broadly from the times of Nat King Cole and Dean Martin to the birth of rock ‘n’ roll with Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” to The Waitresses’ 1981 hit to Michael Bublé’s discography, Molaphany looks at radio and streaming data, comparing the holiday tracks to the artist’s non-holiday hits. Cole was a prolific artist in his short 45-year life with multiple hits– “Nature Boy,” “Orange Colored Sky,” “L-O-V-E”–yet “The Christmas Song” is the best-remembered song from the artist. It’s a kind of defacto one-hit wonder in the public consciousness because the public that remembers has mostly died. But that’s not the case for Michael Bublé, nor Relient K, whose Christmas catalog dominates their Spotify play count until long after the holidays. Even Mariah Carey, who has 19 Billboard Hot 100 number 1 hits over four decades, is celebrating her status as a one-hit wonder.
TO KIDS FROM ONE TO NINETY-TWO. The disappearance of Nat King Cole and older artists’ legacies has been bothering me as I think about musical heritage. I studied jazz guitar briefly, learning some of the standards from the ‘30s to ‘40s, but even almost 20 years ago those songs were just known by the wealthy elderly as instrumentals. It makes me wonder how much of the music I love will be just a product of my time and future generations won’t care about it. Music has been recorded, books have been published, and now everything is on the Internet, a search term away–and yet who’s going to care about that article in which Paris Hilton carries a Versace bag rather than a Prada? It’s just bits of data. Will that be all P.O.D., Anberlin, or The Fray? Kansas, a group with a reliance of 9 million monthly listeners, said “All we are is dust in the wind,” but it seems that we’re all bits of data a solar flare away from a memory wipe. Okay, that’s maybe too pessimistic. I’ll stop. After all, in 2023 Christmas is still relevant, despite the imaginary “War on Christmas.” And as long as Christmas is relevant, the one song that gets to call itself “The Christmas Song” sung by the man who popularized the tune will be remembered, even if you prefer a lasagna to a turkey. -
When Aaron Gillespie announced his solo project would be the band The Almost, it began with the Underoath drummer recording demos and uploading them to MySpace under the moniker The Almost. In 2006, while recording Define the Great Line, Gillespie started writing the album Southern Weather, which he would then take to Aaron Sprinkle and record in ten days, releasing the album in 2007. Gillespie played most of the instruments on the album. Before the release of Southern Weather, Gillespie formed a band to tour and promote the album, including Dusty Redmon and Jay Vilardi on guitars, Alex Aponte on bass, and Kenny Bozisch on drums.
I GET IT, I NEED TO FALL. The Almost’s Southern Weather was a successful record released on both Tooth & Nail and Virgin Records. The lead single, “Say This Sooner” peaked at number 7 on the Alternative Airplay chart. The band’s second album, Monster Monster, was also jointly released through Tooth & Nail and Virgin Records. Gillespie also turned to Aaron Sprinkle for The Almost’s sophomore release to produce the album. Though drummer Kenny Bozisch had left the band, The Almost had become a band, and Gillespie didn’t need to record every instrument other than drums. While Monster Monster shows maturity in lyrical depth and musicality, the album had less crossover appeal compared to its predecessor. Guitarist Dusty Redmon recalls on The Rumors Are All True podcast that The Almost went from playing mostly secular venues to mostly Christian shows when touring Monster Monster. Many of the songs on the band’s sophomore album were explicitly Christian, though perhaps not as anthemic as the first album’s “Amazing, Because It Is” or as shame-ridden as “Dirty and Left Out.”
GOD, I KNOW IT’S GOOD TO YOU. If we look at the arch of Aaron Gillespie’s career, Monster Monster is the point in the artist’s career of beginning to double down on his role in the Christian music industry. Shortly after releasing The Almost’s sophomore record, Aaron Gillespie began writing worship music for what would become his debut solo record, Anthem Song. Gillespie considered worship music the genre in which he began his musical career. In fact, “Amazing, Because It Is” comes from a time when the Underoath drummer would lead worship with touring bands at the Warped Tour. While Gillespie’s public displays of Christianity may have been polarizing, he and his bandmates in Underoath forged many bonds in the scene. Maybe it was Gillespie’s drinking and cursing when fraternizing with other bands. But in 2010, Aaron
announced his departure from Underoath to focus on The Almost and a worship career, beginning with 2011’s Anthem Song. Today’s song “Lonely Wheel” was the lead single from Monster Monster and the second track on the album. The lyrics talk about giving up a sinful life. The focus of the song is about having “one last drink” before completely surrendering to God. The song seems to deal with Gillespie’s struggles as he cleans up his life to fit into the CCM machine. “It may not be a sin to drink, but don’t be seen drinking because others will think of you as a drunk” is just an example of the late ‘00s Christian talk. The song reminds me of when I believed some of those tropes. I thought about how my beliefs could never align with my actions; how I could never bring someone else to Christ because I couldn’t explain my faith and I would always fall back into the sins of the flesh. It was certainly a lonely time at that age and realizing that every Christian deals with those feelings.
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