I’ll always remember that first time at church camp when I learned the John Fisher spiritual song, “Have You Seen Jesus My Lord?” I was about nine. I would sometimes picture the songs we would sing. (For example, I would picture the line “to you alone does my spirit yield” in “As the deer” as (for some reason) a chalky cartoon version of me meeting Christ on a road and letting him pass ahead of me, leading me.) Then I learned to sing “Have you seen Jesus my Lord? He’s here in plain view.”
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Category Archives: Music
Blacksburgia webisode 27: Radio Killed the Talent Show
Radio Killed the Talent Show
Shelor Motor Mile hosts their annual high school talent show, and invite the stars of a local radio program to host the show.
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Blacksburgia webisode 13: Enter Sandman
Blacksburgia webisode 13
Enter Sandman
It is discovered that Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University has been using Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” as an entrance song for over 3 years without actually ever asking the band for permission to use the song.
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When It’s OK to Cover a Song
Let’s settle it for all time. When considering whether you should record a cover of another artist’s song for your new single or album, there is a list of principles to follow.
The criteria for when to cover a song:
- Your version is going to be nearly as good, if not as good or better than, the original.
- Your version will differ significantly enough to be a cover and not a discount replica.
- Your version is one the original artist would be proud to have heard.
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The Avett Brothers’ Magpie and the Dandelion: Album Review (by the Brothers Guard)
After an eight month music fast, moving to a bigger city and staring a new job (Luke), after listening to all my favorite bands I had before the Avetts (Caleb), and after several months’ worth of listening, meditation, and more listening, the Brothers Guard sit down for a dialogue review of Magpie and the Dandelion.
“If you think about a Magpie, it’s a bird from the crow family. You can see them everywhere, and they’ve got this strange grace. And, we all know what a dandelion is. It reminds you of being a kid and watching a flower come apart on a summer day. There’s a youthful wonder in that. Those kinds of feelings live and breathe inside this album.”
-The Avetts
“Bourgeois” by Lorde (Marxist parody)
And we’ll never be bourgeois
(bourgeois)
We don’t own no Capital
Owning property and controlling the means of production in a loop of privatized investment and
……………..unevenly distributed accumulation just ain’t for us
We crave a rise of the proletariat
Let me be your comrade
(Comrade)
You can call me Trotsky
And we’ll labor, labor, labor, labor
Let us share commodity.
Introducing the Crucible with A Satire Blues Song
How do you introduce The Crucible to students? How do you cover McCarthyism and satire in a mini-lesson? How do you treat students to some good music in the process? I came up with a way to sneak a Bob Dylan song in.
I used “The Talkin’ John Birch Paranoid Blues” to demonstrate satire, cover the flaws of McCarthyism, and pair with The Crucible.
Avett Bros. Concert Review—Roanoke 6.20.13
I’ve loved watching the Avett Bros.’s audience grow over the last ten years of following them, even though it’s made it more difficult to be up close to the stage. Last night marks about the seventh time I’ve seen them, and though it’s not the best show I’ve seen, I’m glad they haven’t lost their touch.
I saw them last night at the Roanoke coliseum. Surprisingly, there was no opening band. Not even a local artist. I found that disappointing. Also disappointing was the sound issues, which were resolved early. But considering that the band is still getting used to big arenas, I can see why they’re still adjusting.
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Why I Did A Competitive Amateur Musical for 4 Years—”It’s Makin’ Music Time”
In Henderson, TN there exists a private Christian college called Freed-Hardeman that once a year engages in an extravagantly amateur school-pride-boosting “performance art” tradition called “Makin’ Music“. If that rings a bell for you, keep reading. If it does not, you probably won’t get the rest of this.
In this competitive musical extravaganza, 4-7 social clubs (the sober, co-ed alternative to frats and sororities) design a 7-minute musical number suited for small children, the elderly, tools, people with a permanently sunny disposition, and alumni who forget that they graduated to start a career and a family twelve years ago.
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CALEB COY 