I've got to buy the Jack Johnson album 'In Between Dreams', it's such a chilled out sound perfect for hot days but also because he sounds like a man with something to say.
The track 'Good People' is getting loads of airplay on Radio 2 and I think it would make a good worship trick (a la Jonny Baker) how about playing it over a montage of Big Brother, Celebrity Love Island and so on? Would seriously prompt some big questions about the state of our media, what we choose to consume as viewers etc.
Here are the lyrics...
You win it's your show now
So what's it going to be?
Because people will tune in
How many train wrecks do we need to see?
Before we lose touch
And we thought this was low
Well it's bad, getting worse….
Where'd all the good people go?
I've been changing channels and I don't see them on the tv shows
Where'd all the good people go?
We've got heaps and heaps of what we sow
They got this and that with a rattle a tat
Testing, one, two, man whatcha gonna do
Bad news misused, got too much to lose
Give me some truth now, who's side are we on
Whatever you say
Turn on the boob tube, I'm in the mood to obey
So lead me astray
And by the way now…
Where'd all the good people go?
I've been changing channels and I don't see them on the tv shows
Where'd all the good people go?
We've got heaps and heaps of what we sow
Sitting around feeling far away
So far away but I can feel the debris, can you feel it?
You interrupt me from a friendly conversation
To tell me how great it's all going to be
You might notice some hesitation
Because its important to you, it's not important to me
But way down by the edge of your reason
It's beginning to show and I really want to know is…
Where'd all the good people go?
I've been changing channels and I don't see them on the tv shows
Where'd all the good people go?
We got heaps and heaps of what we sow
They got this and that with a rattle a tat
Testing one, two man whatcha gonna do
Bad news misused give me some truth
You got too much to lose
Whose side are we on today, anyway
Okay, whatever you say
Wrong and resolute but in the mood to obey
Station to station desensitizing the nation
Going, going, gone
Nice work Jack!
Sunday, June 26, 2005
Sunday, June 19, 2005
Mothing
My parents have a new hobby, now that I am 30 I can cope with this and am extremely grateful it was not one they developed during my teens (it was bad enough having a dad AND step dad who were into morris dancing!) as the complete lack of any street-cred would have been mortifying.
They are now into mothing, that is placing a light box in the garden, switching it on at night and seeing what is there come morning (hard core mothers stay up all night cataloguing as the moths fly in! Something to aim at folks!). This all started on a recent trip to watch the moth-ers in action in Chaddesley woods which was fascinating but rather geeky, now the parents have borrowed a box and are contemplating a purchase.
Geeky it may be but like it's similarly unhip cousin bird watching, it is utterly compelling, astounding and absorbing. Overnight on saturday there were more than 20 different types visiting the box and if you thought moths were the unattractive dull brown, annoyingly fluttery, less interesting and somewhat more stupid (with their death wish like attraction to flames and lights) relative of butterflies then you have to think again. There are more than 3,000 types and the colours and markings are spectacular, the most stunning of our haul (on first impression) were the elephant hawk moths - lime green and fuscia pink!
I spent a considerable amount of time scanning the books to try and find one particularly distinctive but elusive fellow, it's like a bug (no pun intended) you have to be able to name the things, you can't let them go till you do! I was chatting to someone recently about how we humans HAVE to describe things and we were questioning whether meaning and understanding comes after naming or vice versa. We were talking specifically about the realms of management speak and how definitions are used to control politics, policies and people but the same thoughts apply elsewhere in life. He wondered if God giving Adam and Eve the right to catalogue all animals in Eden might have had something to do with it, metaphor or not ?! At any rate I discovered the 'little brown job' was called The Flame, and thus all moths were named and released.
The whole experience left me with a renewed sense of the ridiculous generosity of God's creation - these are incredibly detailed creatures, so numerous, brilliantly designed and yet they come out when most people are asleep, they go largely unnoticed.
God lavishes beauty into every possible area of life ... if only we take the time to see it.
They are now into mothing, that is placing a light box in the garden, switching it on at night and seeing what is there come morning (hard core mothers stay up all night cataloguing as the moths fly in! Something to aim at folks!). This all started on a recent trip to watch the moth-ers in action in Chaddesley woods which was fascinating but rather geeky, now the parents have borrowed a box and are contemplating a purchase.
Geeky it may be but like it's similarly unhip cousin bird watching, it is utterly compelling, astounding and absorbing. Overnight on saturday there were more than 20 different types visiting the box and if you thought moths were the unattractive dull brown, annoyingly fluttery, less interesting and somewhat more stupid (with their death wish like attraction to flames and lights) relative of butterflies then you have to think again. There are more than 3,000 types and the colours and markings are spectacular, the most stunning of our haul (on first impression) were the elephant hawk moths - lime green and fuscia pink!
I spent a considerable amount of time scanning the books to try and find one particularly distinctive but elusive fellow, it's like a bug (no pun intended) you have to be able to name the things, you can't let them go till you do! I was chatting to someone recently about how we humans HAVE to describe things and we were questioning whether meaning and understanding comes after naming or vice versa. We were talking specifically about the realms of management speak and how definitions are used to control politics, policies and people but the same thoughts apply elsewhere in life. He wondered if God giving Adam and Eve the right to catalogue all animals in Eden might have had something to do with it, metaphor or not ?! At any rate I discovered the 'little brown job' was called The Flame, and thus all moths were named and released.
The whole experience left me with a renewed sense of the ridiculous generosity of God's creation - these are incredibly detailed creatures, so numerous, brilliantly designed and yet they come out when most people are asleep, they go largely unnoticed.
God lavishes beauty into every possible area of life ... if only we take the time to see it.
Friday, June 17, 2005
Light for Life
The sky does it simply, naturally
day by day by day
the sun does it joyfully
like someone in love
like a runner on the starting line
the sky, the sun
they just can't help themselves
no loud voices, no grand speeches
but everyone sees,
and is happy with them.
Make us like that, Lord
so that our faith is not in our words
but in our lives
not in what we say
but in who we are
passing on your love
like an infectious laugh:
not worried, not threatening,
just shining,
like the sun,
like a starry night,
like a lamp on a stand,
light for life -
your light for our lives.
day by day by day
the sun does it joyfully
like someone in love
like a runner on the starting line
the sky, the sun
they just can't help themselves
no loud voices, no grand speeches
but everyone sees,
and is happy with them.
Make us like that, Lord
so that our faith is not in our words
but in our lives
not in what we say
but in who we are
passing on your love
like an infectious laugh:
not worried, not threatening,
just shining,
like the sun,
like a starry night,
like a lamp on a stand,
light for life -
your light for our lives.
Monday, June 13, 2005
Thank you for the music
Gingerkidjoe, his Mrs and I have got a good thing going ... at least me and the Mrs think so. He happened to mention she liked female singer song-writers and since I have a collection of such I bundled them up and duly sent them home with him. After few weeks they were returned along with some from Jess's collection and we're now on the third leg of this venture.
It's great all the benefits of buying several new CD's, without any of the cost, and if you don't like one you're not gutted and left wishing you'd picked the other one instead - you just hand it back!
It has made me realise that I should really be using my local library for weekly joy of such kind, especially as to have one here in the village is a bonus of the use it or lose it variety.
It has also confirmed my belief that the world is a very small planet and whatever industry you are in it's incestuous (sp?)
to a degree. For instance, Jess lent me Elliot Smith, a rootsy, heartfelt, West coast tinged album, then Joe informed me he was no longer with us. Then the new Ben Folds CD comes out (also heard by kind permission of sellersboy, such a bastion of good taste, musically at any rate, not sure about the one man mission to rival 'Supersize Me', only kidding!) and his thanks go to none other than the said Mr Smith ... the fabric of life is tightly woven I guess.
It also sadly unravels. Elliot Smith's death reminded me of Jeff Buckley and how many more like him for whom suffering won the battle over art. A strange oxymoron that creativity can be so destructive.
Cheers for the flickr tips too gkj!
It's great all the benefits of buying several new CD's, without any of the cost, and if you don't like one you're not gutted and left wishing you'd picked the other one instead - you just hand it back!
It has made me realise that I should really be using my local library for weekly joy of such kind, especially as to have one here in the village is a bonus of the use it or lose it variety.
It has also confirmed my belief that the world is a very small planet and whatever industry you are in it's incestuous (sp?)
to a degree. For instance, Jess lent me Elliot Smith, a rootsy, heartfelt, West coast tinged album, then Joe informed me he was no longer with us. Then the new Ben Folds CD comes out (also heard by kind permission of sellersboy, such a bastion of good taste, musically at any rate, not sure about the one man mission to rival 'Supersize Me', only kidding!) and his thanks go to none other than the said Mr Smith ... the fabric of life is tightly woven I guess.
It also sadly unravels. Elliot Smith's death reminded me of Jeff Buckley and how many more like him for whom suffering won the battle over art. A strange oxymoron that creativity can be so destructive.
Cheers for the flickr tips too gkj!
Sunday, June 12, 2005
Blot on the landscape
I am angry. Near my house they are building a huge new housing estate on a greenfield countryside site. Nimby-ish? No, it is not that the houses are being built that has annoyed me, although it is heartbreaking to witness the brown scar cutting through once verdant fields. But it is the fact that row upon row of homes are going up over night without as much as a park, community centre, parade of shops or place of worship in sight...and I have been scouring for them.
John Prescott says we need new homes and if we do, then we do but the Deputy Prime Minister [shudder] also said, when talking about an innovative development in Greenwich, that all new developments would be environmentally and socially responsible. I think he may have gotten carried away. This massive new building plan doesn't seem to fit that ideal, this is part of the governments 'housing market regeneration' and in striving to complete it 's aims it's not just building on greenfield sites. It's also knocking down out dated properties and rebuilding them, one such, in Liverpool, includes Ringo Starr's boyhood home.
It seems madness that all the empty properties you see in our towns and cities can't be put to good use but we all know they cost more to renovate then build, right? Wrong! At least according to Jeff Howell in last weekend's Telegraph, and he makes a number of interesting points on the matter (listen up Mr P). He says the plans for Liverpool are "justified on the basis that, in the long term [new homes] will save energy - or CO2 emissions to use current jargon. Quite how knocking down thousands of existing homes and building thousands of new ones is going to save energy is beyond the comprehension not just of Ringo and Prince Charles but of most of us in the construction industry too".
He goes on to question the calculations made by the Office of the DPM who are responsible for this policy. He says "their calculations clearly ignor the energy used to demolish the existing properties, and the environmental impact of dumping the waste in landfill sites. Their belief also requires a certain blind faith in the energy saving properties of new houses which, like all government figures these days, are subject to 'targets' ".
So the march of these 'energy efficient' new homes goes on across the south east and northward, forgetting that there is a difference in quality between the respective old and new builds - solid brick walls, sturdy timber floors and partitions, hard to find in today's constructions. It seems ironic that whilst ranks of 'Barrett Boxes' encourage people to remain isolated, they probably get to know more about the lives of their neighbours, thanks to the paper thin walls, than if they met on the street, or heaven forbid, in the community centre!
And so much for the government's drive for 'respect'. Isn't the best way to form a more integrated and respectful society to increase opportunities for people to meet, generations to mix, to learn about each other and foster understanding and a sense of community? Perhaps the plans should go back to the drawing board.
And while we're on the subject of joined up thinking, the reason the cost of regeneration puts it outside the realms of possibility? Mr Howell explains "New building is unfairly favoured over refurbishment by the anomaly of VAT, which is zero for new houses but levied at the usual 17.5% on repairs to old ones". That makes sense - when profit over-rides building a sustainable country, I guess. Not to mention as Jeff Howell concludes that " The factor that the government figures ignor above all, however, is a social one. Victorian streets are what give character and history to most British towns and cities. You can't put a price on that".
Amen, rant over.
John Prescott says we need new homes and if we do, then we do but the Deputy Prime Minister [shudder] also said, when talking about an innovative development in Greenwich, that all new developments would be environmentally and socially responsible. I think he may have gotten carried away. This massive new building plan doesn't seem to fit that ideal, this is part of the governments 'housing market regeneration' and in striving to complete it 's aims it's not just building on greenfield sites. It's also knocking down out dated properties and rebuilding them, one such, in Liverpool, includes Ringo Starr's boyhood home.
It seems madness that all the empty properties you see in our towns and cities can't be put to good use but we all know they cost more to renovate then build, right? Wrong! At least according to Jeff Howell in last weekend's Telegraph, and he makes a number of interesting points on the matter (listen up Mr P). He says the plans for Liverpool are "justified on the basis that, in the long term [new homes] will save energy - or CO2 emissions to use current jargon. Quite how knocking down thousands of existing homes and building thousands of new ones is going to save energy is beyond the comprehension not just of Ringo and Prince Charles but of most of us in the construction industry too".
He goes on to question the calculations made by the Office of the DPM who are responsible for this policy. He says "their calculations clearly ignor the energy used to demolish the existing properties, and the environmental impact of dumping the waste in landfill sites. Their belief also requires a certain blind faith in the energy saving properties of new houses which, like all government figures these days, are subject to 'targets' ".
So the march of these 'energy efficient' new homes goes on across the south east and northward, forgetting that there is a difference in quality between the respective old and new builds - solid brick walls, sturdy timber floors and partitions, hard to find in today's constructions. It seems ironic that whilst ranks of 'Barrett Boxes' encourage people to remain isolated, they probably get to know more about the lives of their neighbours, thanks to the paper thin walls, than if they met on the street, or heaven forbid, in the community centre!
And so much for the government's drive for 'respect'. Isn't the best way to form a more integrated and respectful society to increase opportunities for people to meet, generations to mix, to learn about each other and foster understanding and a sense of community? Perhaps the plans should go back to the drawing board.
And while we're on the subject of joined up thinking, the reason the cost of regeneration puts it outside the realms of possibility? Mr Howell explains "New building is unfairly favoured over refurbishment by the anomaly of VAT, which is zero for new houses but levied at the usual 17.5% on repairs to old ones". That makes sense - when profit over-rides building a sustainable country, I guess. Not to mention as Jeff Howell concludes that " The factor that the government figures ignor above all, however, is a social one. Victorian streets are what give character and history to most British towns and cities. You can't put a price on that".
Amen, rant over.
Sunday, June 05, 2005
Definitely a grower!
Had this cd as a belated birthday present and it was totally unexpected (not the present, the sound!). I had asked for an album by the David Crowder Band having heard a guitar driven, slightly indie effort in a London shop about two years ago and never got around to purchasing it. This, however, is not that! Remixes by different producers that left me unsure as to whether it was a fond return to 'old school' dance or another Christian record missing the cutting edge. I am now loving it but not convinced the teens I know would feel the same!
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