"Cadence" by anberlin, Tuesday, September 6, 2022 (partial repost)
"Cadence" was the third single from Anberlin. Vocalist Stephen Christian talks about the band overhearing him playing the song on an acoustic guitar one day. Thinking the song was too mellow for Anberlin, he thought the song would be better suited for his solo project, Anchor & Braille, but the band loved the song and placed it as the penultimate track on their debut record, Blueprints for the Black Market. The song is inspired by Christian's time in college when he roomed with his brother, Paul. The brothers talked about life, philosophy, relationships, and God, and the song was a culmination of those late night conversations. The song features some of the best drumming on the record. Before the band's livestream of the album Nathan Young, who was fifteen at the time of recording Blueprints, tells a story about how producer Aaron Sprinkle's brother Jesse, drummer of Poor Old Lu and later Demon Hunter, was brought in to record drums on the record because Aaron was skeptical of Young's ability. However, Nathan Young proved himself competent, and his drumming can be heard throughout the entire album. The drums on "Cadence" showed the beginnings of a great drummer.
THE CLOSER I COME TO YOU, THE CLOSE I AM TO FINDING GOD. For me, Blueprints for the Blackmarket, and especially "Cadence" will forever remind me of the trip I took to Florida with my family on Labor Day weekend sophomore year of high school. I can still smell the cheap vanilla air freshener wafting to the back seat of the crammed 1996 beige Toyota Corolla, all three kids, including high school teens armed with elbows fighting to expand their borders. The reason for this trip was to celebrate my great-grandfather's hundredth birthday. We had certainly taken the twelve-hour trip by car before and it was always unpleasant. Besides the fighting for space in the backseat, there was the downright vicious quarrellings between my parents. It usually started about speed, then an insult to the radio, then a self-righteous accusation followed by an insult of the other's intelligence. All the while Hall & Oates, Elton John, Chicago, or some other dull soft rock was blaring so that my sisters and I had to turn up our Walkmans so loud to drown out the whatever my mom wanted to listen to. There were a few occasions I was able to sneak Blueprints into the tape-player (I had to record albums on tapes to listen to them on trips because we drove old cars), and I got away with it because Blueprints almost sound like classic rock. But the memories of this trip come from underneath Sony headphones.
IF THESE ARE MY PARTING WORDS. The weekend is a blur, and I'm left with faint impressions: sweating in a baggy long-sleeved dress shirt newly bought from JC Penny; listening to a string quartet for special music of my grandfather, great aunt, second cousin, and my mom--who had practiced only the night before for hours to make the piece of music work--as a kind of preview for the actual event on Sunday afternoon at the church reception hall; my great aunt MC-ing the event, telling the story of my great-grandfather's life interspersed with videos tributes, special music --one hymn I played on the classical guitar--, and stories told by elder church members; and the pool party my cousin and my sister and I threw for just us. Then on Monday we drove back home because school started back on Tuesday. Reflecting back on that experience in the back seat of the car, I thought about all the stories about my great-grandfather I heard from my dad when he started dating my mom. My great-grandfather was my dad's first encounter with a Seventh-day Adventist, and there were quite a few eccentric stories about how many strange things he ate and drank over the years. My thoughts from the back of the car was about how lonely it would be to live to be a hundred. My great-grandfather's day revolved waking up early, drinking green slime, studying the Bible, and going to church, and going to bed early. Maybe years of the same rhythm made him content. I wonder, to this day, what of my great-grandfather's story do I want for me; what should I jettison?
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