ipod therefore i am

My world has ground to a halt...

The ipod, which has never been more than a few metres from my person since I first got it, has packed in...

It's a gadget that's enabled me to listen to my huge range of CDs with the click of a wheel. Forget downloading - just being able to hear so much of my own music conveniently is just brilliant.

I would liken it to when people moved from manually changing channels on their TVs to using a remote control instead.

Apple are sending me out special packaging for me to return it to them. Thankfully it's under warranty.

Don't be too long!!

The glory game?

Football (and English football in particular) is an increasingly dirty business.

Although Spurs have had a successful few seasons, and I still (reluctantly) am giving them my money when I go over to the North London derby next month, the events of the last week at Tottenham leave a bitter taste in the mouth - with no-one coming out of it smelling of roses. It's symptomatic of everything that's destroying this wonderful game.

The Spurs board openly went behind Martin Jol's back to seek out a new coach, after THREE games of the season. After they failed to get their man from Sevilla, the bare-faced lying to cover-up the whole sorry affair was disgusting. Spurs are now the laughing stock of the premiership both on and off the pitch.

Meanwhile Martin Jol has allegedly been talking to other clubs such as Newcastle and Ajax over the past year in order to lever a pay-rise from Tottenham.

Our supposed "star" player (for on the pitch reasons, for the second half of last season only - let's not get carried away) Berbatov said today that he's staying at Spurs of his own free will, and also let the press know that the club were giving him a huge pay rise.

"Of his own free will" - what happened to contracts? We all know that he'll be off to Man United as soon as the next opportunity arises.

Money is ruining the integrity, value for money, entertainment, and competitiveness of this league. To the clubs we're no longer supporters, just customers.

Only the recent success of the NI football team has kept my faith in football alive - a bunch of modest players united only by a desire to play for a team and country that have been getting results against the odds.

The Proclaimers, a Shared Future, and some mountains

I read an article in the paper last week on the new musical "Sunshine on Leith" featuring the music of the Proclaimers, which is taking Scotland by storm. Their album of the same name sold 25,000 copies in the UK LAST YEAR!!

Coincidently later that dayI went for a walk with the dog and "Letter from America" was the first song that started playing on shuffle on my ipod. It was one of the songs that always seemed to be around when I was a boy, and dad liked it too so anytime we were in the car he would turn it up if it came on the radio. I love their music - funny, honest, delightfully out-of-kilter with musical trends, and unashamedly sentimental.

There's something very comforting about their music - their greatest hits should be in everyone's collection. No they're definitely not cool but there's a unifying, generation-spanning attraction to their music. Lisa used to tell me of going clubbing in Glasgow during her student days when, at the end of each night the DJ would put on "5oo miles" and the crowd would split into two, singing the song to each other. I've worked with Scots about my age who love their music as well. I remember very vividly a conversation with a drunken Glaswegian woman in a chip shop off Sauchiehall Street one night a few years back- she was coming out of a (sold-out) concert of theirs across the road and told me they were the greatest band on the earth.

Maybe I've been over-exposed to NI recently, but sometimes (just sometimes) I long to be Scottish. My family are of Ulster-Scots stock, and a recent expedition to the summit of Ben Nevis last Winter showed me how stunning the country is, and brought a lump to my throat. The BBC's "Mountain" programme focussed on the Cairngorms this week and it was absoutely breathtaking.

I love it that, despite sectarian divisions - there is a common music that the Scottish people can laugh, dance and sing to together. In the north everything is still so polarised - our culture - music, sport, leisure activities - not too mention many streets in Belfast still divided by "peace" walls. A government strategy called "A Shared future" has set out to try and tackle this but has shown little sign of being implemented. Our politicians are happy to get on with "bread and butter" issues in the new devolved government but have forgotten about the daily bread of our people just getting on with each other.

That's a mountain to climb.

Sunderland - what's going on?

So I was sitting in the Pavilion bar on the Ormeau road on Saturday watching Spurs yet again fail to realise their potential by struggling to achieve what seemed likely to be a draw against newly-promoted Roy Keane-derland..then the (sadly) inevitable happened. Michael Chopra fired in a 94th minute winner, guaranteeing the cloggers an opening day victory.

But the whole place erupted into huge cheers when Sunderland scored. I noticed about half a dozen Spurs supporters watching the game, the rest were tucking into lunches or chatting with friends but then chaos broke out. Honestly the atmosphere was like a cup final.

Are Spurs hated that much??

Is Keane still so popular among Man U/Republic of Ireland supporters that they'll even support any team he manages??

As for Spurs. I'm heading over to London next month to see them play Arsenal and I'm very very worried!!

Mezzamorphis by Delirious - blast from the past

After getting Derek Webb's album a few weeks ago I decided to dig out this old classic Mezzamorphis by the Christian band Delirious? released back in 1999.

Never mind the terrible, terrible cover. Mezzamorphis was the best album Delirious? have ever made - and will probably never come close to it again.

King of Fools, an album of praise and worship-based rock songs released in 1997, was a massive hit, made a dent in the UK charts - and along with the Cutting Edge tapes revolutionised modern church music (initially for the better - but have now led to the James-Blunting of worship that is blighting our churches, see my earlier post) when they were released in the USA.

In between King of Fools and going to the States though, they released this gem. It's a total contrast from King of Fools: dark, full of doubt, poetic, and sonically adventurous. The title was a made-up word - emphasising the feeling of being in-between worlds, in between where you were and where you want to be. These are songs about the journey of faith. I didn't really appreciate the album at the time as I was so caught-up in the hype of the charismatic worship scene that Delirious? very much played a part in. It's the one Delirious? album that I now revisit the most.

Sadly the album is now neglected for the most part - I've seen them live quite a few times and songs from it are rarely revisited. The band now tour the church worship scene in America and the world over - repeating themselves and falling into the genre they created that, with Mezzamorphis, they looked to be moving on from. Sadly this was not to be.

Mezzamorphis even made a dent on the charts, and a few single releases went top 40. It still sounds great, most Delirious? albums are really well-produced anyway. About half the songs on 2003's World Service came close, but this 1999 album was Delirious? at their peak.

The National play Belfast

I'm really excited that The National from the USA are playing Spring and Airbrake in October. I've been following them for the last few years and their most recent album Boxer is great.

Very interesting lyrically - a sort of urban-themed regret and loneliness/longing for community, with some original terms of phrase. These lyrics are from Looking for Astronauts on their last album

Take all your reasons and take them away To the middle of nowhere,

and on your way home Throw from your window your record collection

They all run together and never make sense

But that's how we like it, and that's all we want

Something to cry for, and something to hunt

The singer sounds a bit like the guy from the Tindersticks and musically they sound is somewhere between early Strokes and Willard Grant Conspiracy.

The crowds at Spring and Airbrake have begun to annoy me recently- either the place has been full of people too cool to listen to the music and just want to be seen, or full of Stella-ed up culchies /spides singing about Buckfast. Hopefully this one will be OK.

The (James) Blunt-ing of worship

American Worship artist Chris Tomlin is to play the Odyssey arena here in Belfast this week.

I think this has been the latest in a line of recent worship "concerts" in the Odyssey over the last few years.

It makes me a bit uneasy that events like this are more and more common - exalting the role of worship leader to that of a popular entertainer and then "God shows up" (I hate this term - it reduces the almighty to some sort of genie-figure that is summoned by whoever's leading the proceedings)

Don't get me wrong, if people want Christian entertainment - by all means folks are entitled to it - when it starts overlapping with worship of God is when it starts to worry me.

Worship has been commodified into a product that's in danger of taking our focus away from the Creator God and unto creator man instead.

As worship events become increasingly slick, and the accompanying CDs more and more smooth, bland, and unadventurous, I worry about how this style of worship in our churches reflects on how we see the world around us and vice-versa.

The prophet Amos' words to Israel from God about the noise of their songs and improvising away on their instruments while neglecting those around them made sense to me when I was thinking about this. It seems that the Lord wasn't annoyed about their musical ability but because they carried no credibility with the world outside.

I was involved on the music side of things in the church for a while and this really set alarm bells ringing for me and my involvement, attitude, and motivation.

Sex God

A deliberately provocative title for the latest book by Rob Bell, founder of Mars Hill Church in Michigan, the latest big name American Christian writer and speaker.

What attracted me to his first book Velvet Elvis -Repainting the Christian Faith was his open-ended style of writing. Each chapter was like a conversation with himself - then just when you're agreeing with him then he chucks a real curveball into the discussion to really get you thinking. You might not agree, but to him that's Okay - it's a discussion.

The subtitle of this book is Exploring the Endless Connections between Sexuality and Spirituality. It tackles a big question that's recently been plaguing me in relation to the evangelical church - we don't know what it means to be human. he explains that the word sex comes from a Latin root that means to be cut off or severed. We’re born into a world of disconnection, we’re disconnected from the earth, from each other, from God and ourselves. People say “I don’t know who I am”. So, sexuality is all of the ways that we are aware of this cut off state we’re in and the desire to reconnect.

Stylistically Sex God is very similar to Velvet Elvis, and is maybe too open-ended for some tastes, and I was expecting some discussion around homosexuality (maybe that's for a later book) but the final chapter where he draws everything together into exactly why he thinks Jesus uses the wedding analogy for his relationship with church is classic. I read this while I was away from Lisa in Chicago for a few days and it really gave me goosebumps!

Vic Reeves and Paulo Coelho - Two Journeys

Two names you wouldn't expect to read in the same sentence!

Since finishing On The Road a few weeks ago, I've recently finished reading two more books. It hasn't been intentional but the last few books have all been about journeys of some kind.

In many ways these two books couldn't be more different.
Me:Moir is the comedian Vic Reeves' account of his childhood and teenage years growing up in Darlington.

The Alchemist is Paulo Coelho's (now ubiquitous) book about a Spanish shepherd boy and his journey of self-discovery to Egypt and back.

It has been said that The Alchemist contains many autobiographical elements, which I hope to discover more about as I read Coelho's books further. Me:Moir on the other hand, would appear to be mostly autobiographical, but I don't believe for a moment that Vic Reeves was a ten-stone baby!

Me:Moir reminded me that my journey of growing-up is just as eventful as Vic Reeves' (drawing cartoons, playing in bands, being crap at sports, making my own fun during boring family holidays) and I don't have to think that my life has been boring and dull in comparison (although Vic can tell a better story than me).

The Alchemist showed me the importance of self-reflection - seeing how circumstances and seemingly random occurences then became pivotal moments in your life.

Vic Reeves' book is light reading for sure, but it's an enjoyable way to spend a few hours. The Alchemist has been dismissed as a mere self-help manual - but sometimes just one line from a book (or a song, or a poem) can say something very meaningful (whether profound or simple) to a person much more powerfully than a thousand words in a sermon, text book or a lecture.

Derek Webb - The Ringing Bell

If like me you've lost faith in artists from the Christian music scene having anything worthwhile to say then you might like Derek Webb.


I downloaded his last album "Mockingbird" for free from his website last year and it was one of the lyrically hardest-hitting and musically beautiful country rock records I'd ever heard. He used to be in the Christian band Caedmon's Call and now has released his fourth proper album "The Ringing Bell."

Lyrically - Think Freewheeling-era Bob Dylan meets pre-senile Larry Norman who then go and ask Martyn Joseph out to play.

Musically - The Beatles' Revolver and Teenage Fanclub. Like Mockingbird this is lovingly produced and is a joy to listen to.

Although not as hard-hitting as Mockingbird it still packs some punches. Here are the lyrics to
"This too shall be made right:"

people love you the most for the things you hate
and hate you for loving the things that you cannot keep straight
people judge you on a curve
and tell you you’re getting what you deserve
this too shall be made right

children cannot learn when children cannot eat
stack them like lumber when children cannot sleep
children dream of wishing wells
whose waters quench all the fires of Hell
this too shall be made right

the earth and the sky and the sea are all holding their breath
wars and abuses have nature groaning with death
we say we’re just trying to stay alive
but it looks so much more like a way to die
this too shall be made right

there’s a time for peace and there is a time for war
a time to forgive and a time to settle the score
a time for babies to lose their lives
a time for hunger and genocide
this too shall be made right

I don’t know the suffering of people outside my front door
I join the oppressors of those who i choose to ignore
I’m trading comfort for human life
and that’s not just murder it’s suicide
this too shall be made right

His music's quite hard to find in the shops so check out amazon or www.derekwebb.com

Snore Patrol zzzzz.......

So Snow Patrol have sold out Ward Park in Bangor for yet another "homecoming" next month..

Snow Patrol sold out a long time before that.

it's a sad indication of the music scene in NI that these boys are so massive in the UK and USA.

That friggin Chasing Cars song is everywhere - all of their songs follow that repetitive 4/4 beat, and what about those lyrics...hands open, eyes open, opening eyes, running, lighting up, holding on. They make Oasis' lyrics profound in comparison

Surely popular music has moved on??

I'm not even sure if they were all that good before they hit the big time. maybe they were in the right place at the right time?

Don't get me wrong it's not just them. This sort of spineless stuff is flavour of the month at the moment - and is as "indie" as The Kooks, Hard-Fi, or even McFly.

Watching a documentary about Ulster music the other night highlighed just how average Snow Patrol are compared to Van Morrison, Rory Gallagher, Neil Hannon,even Ash. Bands like Duke Special are far more innovative and still have mass potential.

They're just an OK band - let's leave it at that.