This blog examines, reviews and discusses how worship is being lived out in culture and in the church. We tackle everything from songwriting techniques in corporate worship, to interviewing worship leaders and pastors, to reviewing the last big rock concert.
Loops in Worship recently interviewed me about my music background and loop work. I was humbled Will thought I might have something interesting to say or that people would be interested in hearing what I have to say. Anyway, check it out when you get a chance and make sure to browser around the rest of the site. They offer a lot of great resources for those interested in looping.
Leave a comment over there too if you are so inclined and please don’t be alarmed by my paleness in my picture.
My favorite bearded bass player was out of town this past Sunday and that’s the one instrument we are actually one deep on. I don’t typically invite in outside musician’s for worship services. Not that there’s anything wrong with doing that, I’d just rather serve with who we have in the body and not try and play cover up games. Additionally I thought it might actually be really cool and a good change of pace arrangement wise.
As most of you know I compose and play with loops in my band but usually bass parts are not in there. So I had the option to track bass parts and in fact I did do that for 2 songs, Burning Ones and All God’s Children. So instrumentally it was just me, my drummer and the loop and I think it went pretty well. Although the mix in my ears is never a good indicator of what it sounded like in the congregation, which keeps me awake at night actually.
We actually opened with an acoustic arrangement of Ryan Delmore’s Jesus’ Name. I love that song and it can be played so many ways, fantastic song. We also did Phil Wickham’s Messiah just with electric and drums. And for our fourth song we did None But Jesus with keys, electric and drums and I thought that sounded really cool. Our piano player is killer on keys so he carried us on that one. All in all I thought it went reasonably well. Huge thanks to the band Jon, Kendra and Ish…you guys killed it. Can’t wait to have the bearded wonder back slappin da baaaaassssss.
As our final song we introduced All God’s Children by Delirious. This is actually part of our Gospel Community Worship Project and we had 1 gospel community singing along to it in the loop. We’ll be adding more group vocals to it in the following weeks. Excited about this.
Also huge props to Rick Carrera for preaching to the heart this past Sunday. You filled in well for Pastor Aaron and it was awesome seeing you in your gifting brotha. Well done.
This post is part of The Worship Community’s Set List Sundays.
PS22 Chorus have sung a lot of other cool tunes, but this is one of my favorite songs(Lisztomania by Phoenix) in the past few years and they killed it!
This song has been on my to do list for some time and is the first song I’m doing as part of the Gospel Community Worship Project. I’ve always loved this song and been in a couple of Delirious’ concerts when they played it live and it was incredible. The arrangement here has the same instrumental hook that makes the song instantly recognizable.
I did make some changes to the end section, namely I don’t do the “there will come a day…” part. I just allow for some repeats on the “Hallelujah” tag. The loop here does have a bass line in it. If you need it muted you’re welcome to download the Reason file and mute it out, or you can comment or contact me and request me to do it for you if you don’t have Reason.
Remember to vote on the loop below, this really helps me get a sense of what folks find useful. Also it is used to calculate top loops widget in sidebar for people to quickly see the better loops.
Song: All God’s Children by Delirious, Album “Kingdom of Comfort”
Key: A
Bpm: 132
Section: Time (bar)
If you download this loop or you’ve benefited in any way or are appreciative of the service, I’d ask that you please consider donating whatever you feel the loop is worth. The amount (including $0) I leave up to you.
You may know James Duke as John Mark McMillan’s guitar player, but James has also recently released his own album under the band name All The Bright Lights. The self titled album is truly beautiful and unique. James was nice enough to take some time and talk with me about the album which I reviewed here. Enjoy.
All The Bright Lights is James Duke, Jon Duke and Jacob Arnold. Two brothers and a good friend. I had been talking with Jon about making a record for a couple years. The Idea sort of lived in a “what if” world for a long time. We would talk about it and how it should sound and how we should make the music. It wasn’t until Jon called one day and said “let’s open our calendars and book dates right now” that it became a reality. Jacob and Jon both live in Atlanta and have played together for years. He was an obvious choice due to the musical chemistry they have together. He also recorded and engineered the album.
From the very beginning Jon and I had talked about making a soundtrack style album. We didn’t really know what that meant as far as if it was going to have singing or not. As we got more into the process Jon started coming up with simple lyric lines for the songs. It all happened really spontaneously. We’d be tracking a part for a song and He would start singing something. It usually came as a response to the sounds we were creating. I think it captured the heart of the music really well.
We wanted to get together without any rules or plans and play music. If it didn’t move us, we moved on. We didn’t spend that much time on tones. We didn’t make sure every part was perfect. Most of the tracks are first takes. If they felt good we carried on. We weren’t interested in making something perfect, we were interested in capturing something real. We wanted to make a soundtrack for people to live their lives with.
We haven’t. Yet. We would like do some shows this year though. We are still working that part out.
We didn’t talk about it, but that is definitely what happened. There are endless stories in the music. Some are written for specific people. Some are written about specific thoughts but everyone can find something for themselves. I think a definite underlying theme would be hope. Hope for ourselves. Hope for others. The hope that comes from knowing we aren’t alone.
I play guitar in John Mark’s band. We’ve known each other and played together for a long time. He came out and hung out with us when we were recording the album. He was really supportive through the entire process. We would have loved him to sing or play on a song, but it never ended up happening.
Making this album was really fun for me. I just played what I felt. It was really liberating. For guitars I brought in a Stratocaster, a Telecaster, a Gretsch Hollowbody, a Danelectro, an old Gibson lap steel, and a couple of acoustics. I was using my old Matchless Chieftain amplifier, along with a Goodsell Super 17. I brought in my normal pedal board and a bag full of extra pedals. The consistant pedals used for the majority of the record would include a Electro Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man, a Boss DD-20 delay, Boss RV-5 reverb, Ibanez Tube Screamer, Paul Cochrane Timmy, Divided by 13 Joyride, MXR Dyna Comp, and a volume pedal. I used a ZVEX Fuzz Factory here and there. I used a Digitech Expression Factory. We used a pair of SM 57’s to mic the amps. On the song “Walls” I used an oscillating fan to blow on the strings on my guitar to create the drone in the beginning of the track. I think that made a really cool sound. It sort of happened by accident. I had my guitar sitting on a bench and the fan was blowing on it. I was hearing this sound and when I realized what was going on we stopped everything and started playing with it. Making pads from a fan. You can hear the fan motor through the pickups. It is a great sound. Most of the guitar sounds just happened. I don’t think I could ever do it exactly the same again. Partly because I can’t remember what I was using. That’s the story of my life though. I always say that I’m gonna make notes of my settings but I never will, because I think I’ll remember them which I never do.
Musically, some major influences for us would be The Killers, Daniel Lanois, Ryan Adams, Buddy Miller, Sunbears! and U2. I’m really influenced by writers like Dave Eggers and Cormac McCarthy. I’m a huge Wes Anderson fan. I could watch The Royal Tenenbaums every day.
We will play shows this year. We will make more music.
We support all athletics. We just don’t watch it. Thanks for taking the time on this little southern ambi-rock band. We really appreciate it.
I don’t often get excited for instrumental/ambient records, but then again I don’t often(ever) hear those records made by guys with this kind of creative rock sensibility. This southern ambi-rock band dubbed All The Bright Lights consists of James Duke, Jon Duke and Jacob Arnold, two brothers and a good friend.
The self titled album opens with a short track called I saw You Running which threw me into the tumbler of what to expect with the rest of the record, a good teaser. But the next track, The Chest of Drawers, really made me come to attention by somehow beautifully combining dark, rich guitars and church bells with this alt-country riff. The song is really an incredible sonic journey and gets you really excited about what’s possible with the rest of the tracks by letting you know loud and clear, this isn’t going to be a let down.
To say it’s a completely instrumental or ambient album is not entirely correct, there are some beautifully haunting vocals in The Door which leaves you hanging onto the line “you came and made a way.” That line introduces the core concept of the album, redemption, that is echoed by some other tracks with vocals, The One That Gave It All, Walls and Shadow of the King. These are simple songs of redemption woven through and exposed through the rich sounds of redemption.
Each song sets the plate emotionally, they are each moving and beautiful, not incomplete but yet allow room for the listener to reinterpret. I find myself singing new songs over each listen and that makes for an incredibly enjoyable album. One that I suspect will remain so for quite some time.
Close Your Eyes is a perfect closing crescendo for the album, the longest song, full of surprises and twists that introduce some new elements but also wrap up what was really a sonic journey. All the Bright Lights combines remarkably rich textures with a driving tension and soaring guitar melodies that resonate just right. If you’re looking for a soundtrack to life, then buy All the Bright Lights. or Amazon.
Also make sure to checkout my interview with James Duke from All the Bright Lights.
All the Bright Lights on myspace.
The people are growing restless, dare I say angry that John Mark’s stuff has been taken down from Amazon and iTunes. Please everyone lay down your pitchforks, I just spoke with John Mark and here’s the deal.
He’s on a new label (Integrity) and on tour now so go catch a show and buy one his vinyls. And while you’re at it, buy one for me and send it to me…pretty please. Keep up to date with his blog, website and twitter. And of course stay tuned here for all your JMM breaking news.
Electro-Harmonix makes the absolute best analog effects pedals in the biz and the Memory Man is of course one of the all time great pedals that’s in nearly everyone’s arsenal, including mine. The one problem with it has always been no tap tempo. Even the Edge was bothered by this and would have to start a lot of U2’s songs because the tempo would be set by his delay settings. Well EHX went ahead and solved this and introduced a heck of a lot more(expression pedal, tap divide, …) with their new Deluxe Memory Boy pedal. I want it and I want it badly. Check it out:
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