40 replies to this topic

[mrmando]

Anybody else think I really outsource book blurbs to a team of ghostwriters in India? Show of hands?

Previous post was missing one of these, I guess:

Edited by mrmando, 22 October 2010 - 04:36 AM.

[Joel]

mrmando, on 22 October 2010 - 04:36 AM, said:

Anybody else think I really outsource book blurbs to a team of ghostwriters in India? Show of hands?

Previous post was missing one of these, I guess:

It was all so detailed! Now I really wish it was true.



edit: I realize that most people would say "I wish it were true" but I think that's annoying. My editor changed that multiple times in my book and even though it's "correct" I think it cramps my style. But anyway.

Edited by Joel, 22 October 2010 - 09:35 AM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

BTW, Joel, I don't think I've mentioned this yet, but I got a kick out of the fact that (1) you spend one chapter (or part of it) ruminating on the transition from CDs to MP3s, i.e. from physical media to virtual media, and (2) shortly afterwards you ask the reader if he or she ever felt like throwing your book across the room. Given that I was reading your book on my cell phone, I found that kind of ironic. (And no, I would NEVER throw my cell phone across the room!!)

[mrmando]

Joel, on 22 October 2010 - 09:34 AM, said:

edit: I realize that most people would say "I wish it were true" but I think that's annoying. My editor changed that multiple times in my book and even though it's "correct" I think it cramps my style. But anyway.

Well, I wish the subjunctive were still being taught in schools...

[Joel]

Heading to the Canadian version of the Kindlings Muse tonight! Discussion of themes in my book, including but not limited to the relationship between Nine Inch Nails and dc Talk. (I hope.)

[Peter T Chattaway]

The Kindlings Muse podcast, featuring Joel and three other people (including myself).

[Tyler]

Peter T Chattaway, on 10 November 2010 - 06:13 PM, said:

The Kindlings Muse podcast, featuring Joel and three other people (including myself).

The podcast was a lot of fun, but you didn't take the obsessive interconnectedness tangents quite far enough. John Mark Painter worked with Sixpence None The Richer (i.e. Joel's favorite band) on their self-titled 1997 album, which was produced by none other than Steve Taylor.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Tyler wrote:
: The podcast was a lot of fun, but you didn't take the obsessive interconnectedness tangents quite far enough. John Mark Painter worked with Sixpence None The Richer (i.e. Joel's favorite band) on their self-titled 1997 album, which was produced by none other than Steve Taylor.

I wasn't aware of Painter's involvement in that album, but yeah, it did occur to me afterwards that in all this talk of Christian artists "going secular" -- including my reference to Taylor's brief thing with Chagall Guevara -- I could have drawn the connection between Taylor and Sixpence on that album (which, like it or not, did spawn a massive worldwide hit on secular radio).

[Joel]

SEATTLE TOMORROW NIGHT!

This is the last reading I'm doing this year, and maybe the last one for a very long time.

[Overstreet]

Wish I could be there, Joel. It's a shame it's happening the same night as Anne's poetry reading. I hope you'll forgive my bias.

[Joel]

Tyler, on 13 November 2010 - 11:45 PM, said:

you didn't take the obsessive interconnectedness tangents quite far enough.

This is rarely, rarely said of me.

[Crow]

I loved the book. Joel has a distinct amusing voice. As a member of the Petra/Stryper generation of Christian rock, I appreciated the opportunity to experience the viewpoint of the post-Stryper Chrindie Tooth and Nail generation. It never ceases to amaze me that there are young Christians today who have no clue who Carman, Sandi Patti, or One Bad Pig are. That gives me a kind of hope.

Edited by Crow, 02 December 2010 - 01:10 PM.

[Joel]

Crow, on 02 December 2010 - 01:03 PM, said:

I loved the book. Joel has a distinct amusing voice. As a member of the Petra/Stryper generation of Christian rock, I appreciated the opportunity to experience the viewpoint of the post-Stryper Chrindie Tooth and Nail generation. It never ceases to amaze me that there are young Christians today who have no clue who Carman, Sandi Patti, or One Bad Pig are. That gives me a kind of hope.

Crow, thank you so much, for real. It means a lot to me.


By the way for those in Vancouver metro, I will be at the New Bohemian (on West Broadway) at their "Telling Tales" event March 21 at 8 pm. (Think "The Moth" -- true stories told live without notes.)

[Joel]

Christianity Today has an excerpt today. Originally titled "Christian Rock: An Incomplete, Partial, Biased, and Pretty Much Accurate History."

Link here?

For some reason I can't post a link...trying again

www.christianitytoday.com/ct/music/commentaries/2011/christianrock.html

Edited by Joel, 10 May 2011 - 12:57 PM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

The American Conservative, of all things, has responded to Joel's "history of Christian rock":

This is all true, but I think Hartse is still understating the level to which Christianity influenced rock and roll in the 1960s and ’70s. For instance, Tommy James and the Shondells were rocketed to fame primarily by sexual songs like “Hanky Panky,” “I Think We’re Alone Now,” “Mony Mony,” and “Crimson and Clover,” but their later hit “Sweet Cherry Wine” was a protest against the Vietnam War with the claim that “Only God has the right/to decide who’s to live and die.” After the band broke up, Tommy James embarked on a solo career, and his second album was entitled Christian of the World and dealt heavily with religious themes.

Other musicians of the era that featured Christian themes in their work include Jackson Browne,Van Morrison, and (of course) Bob Dylan, but the most explicit (and most unexpected) was Black Sabbath, the original heavy metal band fronted by Ozzy Osbourne. The legendary rock critic Lester Bangs made the same observation in a 1972 article when he wrote that Sabbath was “probably the first truly Catholic rock group, or the first group to completely immerse themselves in the Fall and Redemption: the traditional Christian dualism which asserts that if you don’t walk in the light of the Lord then Satan is certainly pulling your strings, and a bad end can be expected, is even imminent.”

Incidentally, Joel, some friends of mine who are much more steeped in the history of CCM than I have pointed out that People's album was titled I Love You, not Love, and that there is some debate as to whether the "Jesus" title was ever seriously considered or was just one of those stories that Larry Norman made up after the fact. (I believe the documentary Fallen Angel gets into this.) For whatever that's worth.

[Joel]

Yeah, I thought it was an interesting article -- and pretty accurate too. It caused me to download the Tommy James record "Christian of the World" which is pretty rad.

I forget where I got that info about Larry Norman. I have a suspicion it was an old version of his wikipedia page. This is why I wrote a memoir instead of a real history of Christian rock.

[Joel]

If anyone is interested, I've been keeping track of reviews here. A new one came out recently, calling the book "edgy." I guess I could see that?

[Joel]

Hey, I just did an interview on a radio show in Connecticut. They were doing a feature on Christian metal and did a short conversation with me. My bit is from about 34 to 45 minutes through http://www.yourpubli....org/node/18136

[Joel]

SLRR is on sale for 30% off until Sept. 30! Use the coupon code 93277 at checkout: https://wipfandstock..._Life_on_Record

[Joel]

And we're back! I'm doing a reading at Seattle Pacific University at the end of February! It'll be a joint reading with Jeff Keuss, author of Your Neighbor's Hymnal: What Popular Music Teaches Us About Faith, Hope, & Love. Details coming ASAP... it will be a Thursday night, either Feb 21 or 28.

Would love to see any Seattlites who are interested!