If I Were More Sanctified, Would Wife Like My Music?

Published on by D. G. Hart

How far does sanctity go? How extensive is w-w? All of me belongs to Jesus and I am a new man in Christ, but what does this mean for taste? Can holiness account for taste?

Last night I was listening to a sequence of Klangkarussell mixes on Youtube. Who the Hades are Klangkarussell, you ask? I’m not sure but ever since I started listening to Rob da Bank I’ve become aware of contemporary dub step, dance and electronic performers that take me back to the days of Mike Oldfield and Klaus Schulze (and yes, Brian Eno). Since Rob has not yet started is weekly show on BBC Radio 6 (moving from Radio 1), I have had to look for alternatives. Pandora and Spotify have their moments. But at some points their musical memes become repetitive (even though so much better than Taylor Swift).

But that is exactly what the missus thought last night as I became energized by one of the mixes by Klangkarussell. “Turn that racket down,” was the kind charge I heard coming from the kitchen.

And here I thought we were on the same cultural plane. We grew up with the same television shows, cut our teeth cinematically on Woody Allen and Ingmar Bergman, and identified as Preppy’s in early adulthood. We just finished Happy Valley, a terrific BBC/Netflix production that puts the drama in dramatic, and we both had similar assessments — four thumbs up (so much better than Season Three of The Killing). (Cordelia missed most of the series while snoozing upstairs.) We also recently traveled to Ann Arbor to see The Trip to Italy, the Steve Coogan, Rob Bryden sequel to The Trip. The wife and I thoroughly enjoyed this movie as much as the first, and thought that maybe even the second was better.

So if we can be so close on the same page of television series and cinema, why can’t we be closer on music. Her tastes run to Motown and sentimental (in my estimate) crooners. Mine run to minimalism whether coming from Philip Glass or Moderat.

If everything deep down is religious or spiritual, then what accounts for the difference? Or if lots of life is merely creaturely and natural, maybe even the Obedience Boys and the cultural transformationalists can’t explain our cultural (and other spheres) lives.

50 thoughts on “If I Were More Sanctified, Would Wife Like My Music?”

  4. I approve of the Brian Eno nod. taking Tiger Mountain by strategy is brilliant in my book.
    now if I can just find it on vinyl. and I find I mean at a flea market or goodwill.

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  8. You may have enjoyed Scritti Politti back in the 80s. I mowed many a yard listening to “Cupid & Psyche 85”.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gje3gQxW9c&list=PL99934B9697A48358

    I just rewatched “The Trip” today. Don’t know if I’ll make it to “The Trip to Italy” while it’s in the theaters. Don’t know if the wife will get it.

    I also just finished season one of “The Hour”. Good recommendation. Dominic West has the loveable cad role cornered. Season two is on the way.

    I’ve also started Eric Rohmer’s follow-up to his Six Moral Tales, his six film “Comedies & Proverbs” series. The first one, “The Aviator’s Wife” is up there with the best of the Moral Tales. These are harder to find than the Moral Tales, though. I’m having to buy the 2nd on Amazon.

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  9. I have never been able to give up secular music and don’t plan on it anytime soon. My Wife listens to delirious?/vineyard/hillsongs downstairs and I watch old videos of the Dead Kennedys, downstairs. I have never thought of the music I listen to being tied to sanctification. I am sort of new to this whole cultural transformation debate; however I know that there just isn’t going to be a satisfactory Christian version of Jello Biafra any time soon. BTW, DGH, Brian Eno is great 🙂

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  12. If you watch “The Trip”, make sure and watch the deleted scenes. It’s a whole another movie.

    Includes the cogent observation that in “Braveheart” like films they always leave at daybreak, never at 9-9:30.

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  13. Having never heard of Klangkarussel, Rob da Bank (love the name), Phillip Glass or Moderat I gave them a listen and a try. They sound a lot like Passion Pit whom I have heard about and listen to on occasion.

    What I started thinking about, while listening to the music, was the music that was played at the “underground” clubs in downtown Chicago in the late 90’s along with the nitrous oxide induced dancing that took place there. It also brought back thoughts of reading Francis Schaeffer books and trying to imagine Fran listening to John Cage music and then relating it to the new philosophical movements in the culture and the avante-garde music scene. Then I started thinking about some bizare scenes from some Coen brothers movies.

    I don’t really have a point but I find that listening to music from a wide variety of different cultural arenas is a good way to get out of the confines of the small world’s we live in and see what else is going on in the world. It helps broaden horizons a bit and you get to hear some good music while exploring the cultural arena’s you would not normally find yourself in. I have found and experienced some great music among the homeless, dispossessed and estranged. But my tastes run toward Dylan, Leonard Cohen and Darrell Scott.

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  14. DGH – tune into WEMU and ignore everything else. If you don’t like the music, give me a good reason why not (never mind the missus).

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  15. The Dutch call her “the vrouw.” And the last time I brought mine to Ann Arbor was when I was still a student and she a Baptist, and we saw “My Own Private Idaho.” Not smart.

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  16. Coming from a Jazz perspective and thus knowing little to nothing about the artists you mentioned, the difference in taste is just to be expected or the different reasons why people listen to music. Some want music to reflect they want to exist while others want music to reflect the world that is.

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  18. I might add that some of the cultural arenas are interesting to visit but you don’t want to take up permanent residence there. But I also have a hard time taking up permanent residence in most churches out there too. It is not easy to get out of the misfit mentality and accept what you cannot change.

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  19. It has been an interesting two years of exile- but I was fortunate to be in exile in Charleston, Savannah and the Appalachian areas of North and South Carolina and Tennessee. Some great music in all the cities I have been in.

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  20. JohnnY, I recently watched the 1965 movie, “Ladies and Gentlemen, Leonard Cohen.” Very good. Looks like it’s available at YouTube.

    Now that you’re not in exile, where are you?

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  24. I would not say my exile is over yet. I was able to get a grant to go back to school at a community college in Blountville, Tennessee. I am learning how to program CNC machines and will be done by Christmas next year.

    The not so good thing is that I have live at the Salvation Army in Kingsport, TN. I am still working on reconciling with my eldest son who is now majority owner of our family business. A much slower process than I anticipated and hoped for. However, I am enjoying the opportunity to go back to school.

    I’ll have to watch that Leonard Cohen movie- thanks for that. He just came out with a new recording that I am still listening to slowly and with great appreciation. Those who enjoy a more upbeat tempo in their musical tastes probably have to be in a different frame of mind to listen to Cohen. Here it is for those who like it slow:

    http://www.npr.org/2014/09/15/347480040/first-listen-leonard-cohen-popular-problems

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  27. D.G.,
    I don’t know why? BTW, can you name the first Jazz artist I listened to? If so, you can be the new Karnak from the very old Tonight Show fame. BTW, some call Jazz, ‘American Classical music.’ I myself call what is commonly called classical music, ‘Classical Music for the rhythmically impaired.’

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  29. C-dubs, sometimes I get a fever for more Hall and Oates (blue-eyed jazz) covers in a van with little lap top keyboards, sunglasses, and kazoos.

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  36. One of the fun things about the arts is the six degrees of separation that you became aware of once you start to get more under your belt. Three months ago I hadn’t heard of Barbet Schroeder.

    http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0775447/

    He stars in Eric Rohmer’s “The Bakery Girl of Monceau” and produced several of Rohmer’s films through his & Rohmer’s production company, Les Films du Losange. Recently I’ve pared down my DVD & VHS library, only keeping things that are not available on Netflix (why take up space when something can be in your mailbox in no more than 2 days?). This morning I put in the 1987 movie “Barfly”, based on the writings of Charles Bukowski and starring Mickey Rourke & Faye Dunaway. And who is the director? Barbet Schroeder.

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  38. Alexander’s theme is that song Groucho sang at the college

    I don’t care what they have to say
    It makes no difference anyway
    Whatever it is (foot stomp)
    I’m against it!!!

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  42. Mike Oldfield still doesn’t get the credit he may deserve for writing and playing the instruments on extended electronic/rock tracks which were unparalled in the early 70’s. From his music I am not thinking though of the album he put together at the age of seventeen as being necessarily his best, Tubular Bells. Follow ups like Hergest Ridge, Ommadawn, and Incantations are arguably just as good as TB altough in very different ways, and interestingly nearly all of them were written while Mike was struggling mentally health wise. After he had some form of therapy in the late 70’s he rarely wrote anything like as good as his earlier stuff. Hergest Ridge, inspired by the beautiful countryside in England’s least populated county of Herefordshire on the border of England and Wales, is typical of Mike’s best post TB music.

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  44. Paul (UK), thanks for letting me feel like I didn’t waste my time with TB, which I have never associated with the Exorcist (never saw it) even if most people do.

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  45. D.G.,

    That’s awesome on Schroeder directing that. I had no idea.

    He also directed “Single White Female”. Jennifer Jason Leigh scared me to death in that.

    On the Criterion edition of “The Bakery Girl of Monceau” there is an extended interview between Schroeder and Rohmer that is quite good.

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