Vintage. by High Dive Heart.

"I love you more today than I did yesterday.
 I will love you more tomorrow than I do today"

Yes, well, the Muse reminds and clarifies that we are loved perfectly, and equally, forever.

With that caveat, enjoy this snappy piece of joy.

Turn to Stone. By Ingrid Michaelson.

Sometime the Muse intervenes in the listening and says "WHOA, NELLY! NOT TRUE!"
That is what happens in this song. Beauty and genius can come from those who know nothing of truth. That is what the Muse says about these lyrics.

"We must atone..."

No. We must DO nothing. The atoning has been done for us. Thinking that we can DO something is putting us all onto Zanax.

And no, I am hearing that we don't REALLY turn to stone either. There is more. Much more.

With that caveat, enjoy this sonically brilliant 3 minutes.

This Year. by The A*Teens

Hope is a strange thing. Since we don't know the future, we can imagine it as an apocalypse or, as these Abba-teens do, as just plain fun.

I wish you what this song does:

This year is going to be incredible.

Incredible? Yes. Believe it. Believe it.

Enjoy

Better Days. by The Goo Goo Dolls.

What did you just say?

Cause everyone is forgiven now
Cause tonight's the night the world begins again

That is what I thought you said, but I can't believe it. Really, it is hard to believe the completeness of forgiveness and the complete and whole break with everything past that it represents. There is no better way to think about forgiveness than as a new start. A new everything.

Not every line of this song is correct, but the new beginning of forgiveness is brilliant.

And, isn't every night when the world begins again?

Enjoy

Happy New Year. by Camera Obscura.

Happy New Year, you are my only vice

Marvelous thinking about love. It really makes little sense to feel affection for others. It violates all the self-interest that seems to be a hallmark of the modern mindset.  The Muse is right to point out this insanity. It is altogether proper blast right through the insanity and have at it for another year.

Enjoy

Christmas. By Darlene Love.

The song Christmas, as sung by Darlene Love, has been heard dozens of times by faithful watchers of the Letterman show. She performs it for his program every year on the last broadcast prior to December 25th.

The Muse takes us through the song's images and remind us that we long for love. But there is more. The sax riffs. The bells ring. The verbal images blur with the passion in her voice. The piano rattles at a furious pace with the violence of the very longing we feel as regular people in this bizarre world. The tambourine slams. And the Muse says there is more... more to this life...more solution than problem, more longing than could ever be made whole by what we see and feel. And yet we are comforted by this unmet longing. We are reminded and encouraged that we can't see more than ourselves with the Muse showing us that there IS more than ourselves.

So, dream big. Then dream bigger. Then repeat. See what the Muse can show you.

Enjoy.

 <--- 1993

2013 --->

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. by Cat Power.

The Muse is very active in Christmas/Holiday music. With reason.

There is a lot of meaning in this short song, but today the Muse opened up the very early part of the lyrics:

from now on, let your troubles be out of sight

The troubles are still there, the pain that they are causing can, will, and does return. For the moment, however, maybe it is too much all at once. Entertain your flesh a little, and ignore the strife. No drugs needed, just hope based in the reality of a better future.

Young people wonder how their professors of poetry can see so much meaning in a given poem, even suggesting that the poet didn't even know what it meant at the moment of writing. But the question remains:

• Can words mean something that the very author never intended them to mean? 

The answer can only be:

• Yes.

While I scoffed at such talk as a 25 year old, I now see it as the only possible way for the world to operate. Language is far too personal for it to be any other way.

Let the Muse speak.
Enjoy.

Silent Night. by The Piano Guys.

This time the Muse spoke directly to the artists:

Start with the second verse to make the old new again.

And they did.

Enjoy.

So This is Christmas. by John Lennon.

"So this is Christmas, and what have we done?"

This is the single worst line in any song associated with Christmas. Christmas is completely about Christ and nothing about us.

Still, the Muse convinced even God-neutral John Lennon to discuss Christ in this song. So, enjoy, but with the huge caveat of the entire lyric being based in the wrong place.

All Year Long. by Michael W. Smith

Like every song that, this one has some lyrical errors caused by the need to rhyme.

Still, this gem jumps out and turns the head toward truth:

May peace guard you hearts and make you strong

I have never before thought of peace and strength together, but the Muse saw it all along. I think that the world views strength leading to peace. It is really the other way around. Peace comes and that is what makes one strong.

Enjoy

I Celebrate the Day. Relient K

I still haven't even come to grips with this song. The Muse assures that that is OK. The only thing so far is: Heaven is so much an "other" place and time and existence that we have only seen a fleeting shadow of how perfection is to lived out forever.

Enjoy.

Heirlooms. by Amy Grant

Go ahead and get down the Christmas decorations again. It is time. 

This is difficult song for me. It looks back. I look forward. It paints a history that has brought us to this moment. I feel like I can remake myself every day. 

I guess the subtle message here is that both are true. We have a past, but it doesn't HAVE to control our future. The Muse says that tomorrow is neither a logical extension of the past nor some whole new version of existence. That would leave us dangling and feeling very alone. It is a combination of the two that God uses as He needs to show us his love. 

Enjoy

Christmas Lights. By Coldplay.

The pop group Coldplay and the Muse are close pals. Chris Martin and his collaborators write just enough actual lyrics without making it a too-obvious ballad. That formula gives the Muse ample freedom to speak to the listener uniquely.

Christmas, as this song reminds, is about taking sin, rejection, tragedy, fighting, and pain, and turning it into something positive. How?

In this little song, it is the trappings of the Christmas Holiday that overcome the grief. Carolers, snow, lights, chandeliers of hope, the street, and the sea all invade the pain. It all really makes no sense. That is why the Muse can use it, and the Muse doesn't have to work hard to expand this to ANY environment invading our little corner of depression with a slowly dawning joy. The world is a whole bunch of pain. And then, out of seemingly nowhere, we experience the universe in our own way and  our outlook improves a little. That is the Muse in our lives. We are capable of only failure without this guidance.

Both pain and triumph are there to show us God's love for us personally. The Muse can even use artificial creations like our modern Christmas remembrance to bring us up the the top edge of the pit of dispare in which we might be and show us another place view life from.

Keep listening.
Enjoy.

In Like a Lion (Always Winter). by Relient K.

I begin Christmas Holiday music as early as my family will let me. After years of reworking what is comfortable for everyone, November 1st is the compromise day on which I can play Christmas Holiday Music again each year. The first song I always select is In Like a Lion by Relient K.

The song begins and then shortly arrives at the core of the lyric:

"Always winter, never Christmas."

Apart from the C.S. Lewis reference to The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, the Muse knows that we need the obvious meaning. On November 1st, many parts of the world have been wintery for a while already, and Christmas day can still seem distant. Little did the listener know that after many song plays, the second layer of this song emerges.

The ending line

"You are here and we will not lose hope."

Just as we wait for Christmas with the help of our friends and family, we ALL wait for that better life.
What is it that allows us to hope? Certainly not ourselves. The Muse is very clear here: hope is a non-sensical externality. We know that God is with us (Emmanuel) in the form of the Holy Spirit, but mere facts are not enough to maintain hope for something more.

The song ends not with a statement about our grit and determination to keep hope alive. Such efforts are tiring and impossible. It is, instead, that God will not let us lose hope, since He is with us. Christmas does come each year, and some day we will have Christmas every day.

Enjoy.

Turn to Stone. By Ingrid Michaelson

Sometimes the Muse will speak in other ways. Some messages go straight to the heart with a clear and present truth to reveal the forgotten and/or teach the unknown. The opposing message is the second way to see things. When the primary message is quite clearly mistaken, the Muse is asking the  patient to trust the doubt and see even more clearly the true message that could not be seen if presented directly.

The direct route is in the path of the Muse here to begin

Let's take a better look

Self-analysis is a good thing, within reason. Balance is the key. So, here the Muse says nothing new, and establishes the context as one of introspection that might result in improvement. Fine

Beyond a storybook

Good. We are no longer children wondering if life is but a dream.

And learn our souls are all we own

Here the Muse plays to the mistaken majority. The counter message of the Muse begins to be developed here. The truth is even bigger: we own nothing. Even our souls are mere shadows. Yet, in this moment of ephemera, the message begins to dawn. The line of reasoning becomes clearer, and the listener must make a choice: the message is either wrong or right.

I suppose most will take the first path and follow the songstress down a very depressing path toward a life of labor that ultimately means nothing and is forgotten like a pebble.

There is another perspective. After more lines of thoughtful development the clarity envelopes the patient:

There's so much more than me and you

Indeed, there is. We are the shadows, and soon to be much more than stones. Again, the message has a choice:

1. We are not the center of the universe, so we shouldn't be selfish, we should help others, etc. Can we measure up? Yes, with selflessness. Can we measure up? Well, it doesn't matter since we are mere dust.
2. We are in the presence of something bigger than we are. Can we measure up? No. Can we be made whole? Yes, but not on our own.

And now the pivotal moment in the message

And brother how we must atone, before we turn to stone.

Message #1.: Work hard, make up for your past sins, and then die in nothingness. Again, I suppose many see life this way.

Message #2.: The Muse beats us over the head with something so impossible as working to earn our own atonement that I must step back and see this from the opposite view. It isn't possible to atone for one's past wrongs. So, the message, for the few that see it this way, is to realize and embrace one's weakness and allow for atonement or more to be done apart from us.

Wonderful peace is the result.

Enjoy.

Cathedrals. By Joan Osborne

I think that the Muse actually wrote this song, or Joan Osborne IS the Muse.

"In the Cathedrals of New York and Rome, There is a feeling that you should just go home, and spend a lifetime finding out just where that is."

Do I find my center in the money and worldliness of New York, or do I find my center's home in the worlds of faith in Rome? The Muse says that neither place with ever give rest. The honest reality says that neither is the external answer to the important questions of existence.

When I graduated from High School, my High School experience ended with a speaker encouraging us to eschew the journey into one's self that was the hallmark of what he saw as that moments self-centeredness and head outward to work for, beside, and with others. Little did he know, but I had really never actually thought about that which he was discouraging us from. I assumed the only vision for proper living was life toward others.  My teaching and upbringing was that life stinks, and our goal can be to help others in all the thousand ways that life can allow that to happen if we are willing participants. The message that day planted in my just what the Muse tells me in this song.

If I go out to work in the chaos of the universe, that is find and good. Nevertheless, home is critical. Knowing how to find home without external religious structures nor fame and fortune.

Marvelous to be reminded of this is such a sonically pleasant way.

Sit. Enjoy.

Boston. By Augustana

Mishmash of random start-something-new lyrics builds around unique pop music (is that a zither?) to allow the Muse to work magic in the mind.

Go ahead, listen to the song and try to NOT consider restarting your life in a different place. Maybe in Spain.

Dreams. by The Cranberries

I adore this song. It has begins with standard pop music and moderately thoughtful lyrics which is my favorite formula. Then, it moves into the about-to-run-off-the-rails section musically at the end that is another hallmark of great songs. Of course, actually devolving into utter musical chaos isn't allowed in great music. Any fool can be chaotic. It is in approaching the abyss but in not going over that is the mark of real work.

Lyrically, the song is true to its title. Then, as if it isn't any big revelation, the Muse steps up the lyrics 5 notches with the line:

"there'll come dreams, impossible not to do, impossible not to do."

The singer goes back to the song with some love song implication which tells me that the most important line is perhaps lost on her. Dreams that are impossible not to do? Chew on that while you enjoy this bit of existential brilliance.  

Sometimes by Step. by Rich Mullins.

This enjoyable song by hoosier Rich Mullins gets our place in life almost right. I hope that Rich (Wayne) knew what he was saying when he wrote this, but I can't be sure given some of his statements near to the time of his car accident that toke him to heaven.

"There was so much work left to do
But so much You'd already done"

"You'd" is correctly capitalized to suggest that God is the agent of action. However, the line before it is the key line: there was so much work left to do by whom? 

The answer is God. Not us. We are called to stand at His side. "My burden is light" isn't a pipe dream. It correctly defines our role as well as God's expectations. He know we can't do much. Well, anything, really.

In the end, enjoy this piece of Musical truth, but be clear about Whom is doing all that "work left to do". It isn't you. Just stand and resist the yoke of slavery which is thinking that all (or anything) we do on our own is worthy of God.

(Galatians 5:1)

I Believe in You. by The Kry

This is a curious and troubling set of song lyrics in many ways. It has a great sound and some great platitudes, but is almost completely untrue. But not entirely.

There are many references in this song to people holding on the Christ, fighting with Him, believing from mountain top to bottom of the ocean. We all know that is a complete fantasy. People that live one hundred years here on earth probably believe a total of 4 minutes. And, even that meager belief is a complete gift from God. Still, the bold statements draw me in every listen and are completely redeemed by the inclusion of the actual truth of our state here on earth at the end of the song.

God is the source of strength and belief and the sustainer of our faith. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. Brilliant and truer words have never been written. The song is off base in centering on human effort to sustain our relationship with God. And then the Muse got ahold of the lyrics and reminded the song writers to get it right by adding the young child reciting actual truth and not the ridiculous fantasy which is the bulk of the song lyric.

So, listen with the understanding that the humanism of the entire song (minus the Romans 8:38-9 reference at the end) is a nice thought and completely devoid of reality. The reality is completely in the words of the four year old at the end.