| Friday, December 22, 2006 |
| ChristianityToday.com review & interview |
*album review* ChristianityToday.com is one of the Christian websites I have more respect for, so I've been waiting to see what they thought of "Oh! Gravity." (which is why this review will get special attention from me) and the wait has ended. I would've liked to see a review from the same guy who reviewed NIS (who seemed to really "get" Switchfoot), but this wasn't bad except for a few things that I had objections about. Its interesting that this magazine gave NIS 5 stars and O!G 4.5 stars, because I think the vice versa would be truer.
I chuckled when she said "Golden" from NIS should've been a single, because I feel like there were many more single-worthy tracks on NIS. And "Golden", in my opinion, was musically the weakest track on NIS, no matter how noble-intentioned it was. Did she even listen to NIS more than once?
[This] could be the central thesis of the project: "I want to live and die for bigger things." I disagree. Yes, that is a sentiment that runs throughout Switchfoot's catalog, but I wouldn't call it the central thesis of this album.
Right down to its name-checking of Lexus cars, "American Dream" shares a little too much in common with Christian radio favorite "Gone." Both of those songs clearly mirror the idea of "wanting more than this world's got to offer"
This is what I didn't get at all. I mean, "Gone" was about the brevity of time, while "American Dream" is about not anchoring your life on material things. They're sonically different songs too. Apart from the "Lexus" mention, I don't see anything similar between these two tracks.
The reason I point these things out is, they're often an indicator of how big a pinch of salt the concerned piece must be read with. Her only gripe about the album was that its thematically too similar to Switchfoot's previous efforts. This is more reason for me to think she's not really followed all their albums, because I think "Oh! Gravity." reflects the most lyrical progression there has ever been, between two Switchfoot albums. The title track, DSH, Yesterdays, Let Your Love, Circles are all entirely new themes for Switchfoot, and the remaining tracks, though they're issues Switchfoot's tackled in the past, they've done it again in the freshest of ways, so I won't hold it against them. To me, Switchfoot is a theme band. An epic sort of band that stands for a way of looking at the world, so time and again they're bound to zone in at the same ideas from different angles. But I understand and share the (maybe slightly selfish?) desire to see Jon's view on pain, pleasure, homosexuality, surfing, or M&Ms, because his observations are known to be thought-provoking.
*interview* A while ago, the magazine did an interview with Jon. I think its my favourite Jon interview. I pulled out some quotables I loved and put these in the "Ongoing collection of quotes" post (see the links section) where I'll collect relevant post-O!G quotes by the guys, as and when I find such gems in interviews and the like. This interview was full of them. It was hard not to pick everything he said as a quote. Here are a couple that pertained to the "Christian rock" issue:
[Signing to Columbia was] a realization of something that we'd wanted to be from the beginning. When we were signed to re:think Records, the goal was to get the music out to everybody. When Sparrow bought re:think Records, it was evident that our music wasn't going to be in the hands of everybody. As a Christian, I have a lot to say within the walls of the church. But also, as a Christian, I've got a lot to say just about life in general ... So to be able to be on Columbia and on Sparrow felt like the realization of the two sides of what we had to say. It's a dream come true to be able to have songs that are outside of the box.
That was probably the best brief explanation I've seen so far from Jon, that, in a single quote, answers both people who put them in the "Christian rock" box, as well as to those that call them sellouts. He rounded it out with:
I feel like people want us to be flying their flag. People will use our words to prove them right. We are not trying to fly the flag of Christendom, and we never have attempted to lift that flag.
I've always been a little bit leery of putting "Christian" as a tagline for anything. If you're going to attach the name of Christ onto something, then you'd better have thought about it for a long time and really feel like that particular product, whether it's a CD or a church or whatever, is worthy of that name. Labels: album reviews., interviews. |
posted by phil @ 4:04 PM  
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thats actually a really good quote to give to someone who doesn't quite get the gist of switchfoot. I know a lot of those people.. and they're missing out on some really good music. (btw. I cant wait to hear Oh!g.. even though you spolied it for me.. what a friend :P) hehe.
;)
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thats actually a really good quote to give to someone who doesn't quite get the gist of switchfoot. I know a lot of those people.. and they're missing out on some really good music. (btw. I cant wait to hear Oh!g.. even though you spolied it for me.. what a friend :P) hehe.
;)