“Rebirthing” by Skillet, Monday, February 13, 2023

 

In 2006, Skillet created the album they used as a template for the albums that they would release for the next sixteen years and counting. At the time when Skillet released Comatose, it was their most mature and refined record following ten years of member line up and style changes. Starting as a post-grunge band then transitioning into industrial around the turn of the  millennium, Skillet began to switch out synthesizers for strings on their 2003 record, Collide. The lead single, “Rebirthing,” highlighted the new Skillet sound, symphonic hard rock. But what was once novel turned banal after all of the following records sounded the same.

I BREATHE YOU IN. While not a maître of metal or hard music but rather a commercial success story and a brand, Skillet’s rebirth brought them to rock radio and landed them on some of the major tours in the active rock genre. As Skillet became more about refining the brand, they leaned into their role as a band in ministry. They became one of the biggest unapologetically Christian bands. And from their stage production complete with pyrotechnics, they made a lot of money on the road. What a Christian band means for Skillet is a propitiation of the conservative politics common in evangelical Christianity during the George W. Bush years. Lead singer John L. Cooper even delved into theology, writing the book Awake & Alive To Truth. But soon, he began tackling political issues, appearing on Fox News, arguing against Critical Race Theory and the so-called “woke agenda,” arguing that both of which is creating a civil war in the church. 

I WANNA LIVE FOR LOVE, I WANNA LIVE FOR YOU AND ME. I’m getting awfully sick of Christian gaslighting, as I believe more and more that I have a right to exist as a gay person. I also believe that we need to look at history through different lenses and that we need to acknowledge that we are a product of wars and inequalities. I think that Skillet’s new music is not to my liking, so it doesn’t make it difficult to give them up. However, after watching a nation display of Christian nationalism on Fox last night, also known as the Super Bowl, I realize that America is composed of the old guard trying to uphold Christian ideals with commercials funded by Hobby Lobby. Patriotism and spirituality on display feels awkward to me. I think it should be in humble heart rather than on full display, sort of like the parable Jesus told in Luke 18:9-14. That being said, after Taylor Swift, Drake or a ton of Nashville acts got the time slot on America’s biggest stage, I can imagine Skillet opening a halftime show with an orchestra playing “Rebirthing,” the band perhaps suspended in the air like Rihanna last night. It will never happen, though, since the country is supposedly going to hell in a hand basket. 


Read the lyrics on Genius.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Photograph" Ed Sheeran, Saturday, February 3, 2024 (updated repost)

Image
  Before " Shape of You ," Ed Sheeran was known primarily as a singer-songwriter. His albums + and X took clear influence from The Beatles , Carole King , Elton John , James Taylor , and the ballad writers of yesteryear. But he had a knack for throwing in a few rap bars along the way. With every record, Sheeran gained more acclaim. His sophomore record produced the mega Billboard #2 hit , " Thinking Out Loud ," which won two Grammys including Song of the Year. The final single from the album, " Photograph " was written in collaboration with Snow Patrol 's Johnny McDaid . Sheeran drew inspiration from his long distance relationship with singer/songwriter Nina Nesbitt (the featured musician on Kodaline ’s acoustic version of “Brand New Day” ). The two spent five months apart. They would eventually break up, but the song remains a gem on Sheeran's second best-selling record.  LOVING CAN HURT . "Photograph" was the song that introduced m
Read more

“Teenage Dream” by Katy Perry (reworked post), Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Image
When I was a Christian teenager, a book started circulating in my church youth group. Joshua Harris wrote about youth with wisdom and authority that seemed logical and categorical for every situation to the young women who read I Kissed Dating Goodbye . The book’s thesis argued that dating was a worldly alternative to the more purposeful Christian concept of courtship. Dating fueled erotic passions, which must be saved for a heterosexual marriage. Dating is casual, even preteens dates. Courtship was about vetting a marriage partner and would happen in the late teen years or early adulthood.  YOU THINK I'M PRETTY WITHOUT ANY MAKEUP ON .  Josh Harris’s I Kissed Dating Goodbye was part of a movement I’ve written about a lot: purity culture. How much this movement influenced young Katy Hudson, a pastor’s daughter in Southern California, touring with a slew of Christian rockers on the heels of her debut, self-titled album , I can only speculate what went through the 17-year-old star’s
Read more

"All of Me Wants All of You" (Helado Negro Remix) by Sufjan Stevens, Sunday, February 27, 2022

Image
I've talked about how Carrie & Lowell , Sufjan Steven 's 2015 masterpiece, is a quintessential portrait of dealing with grief and forgiveness when I wrote about the first two tracks, " Death with Dignity ," and " Should Have Known Better ." By the third track on the record, " All of Me Wants All of You ," explores grief in a different way from the previous two tracks. As with most songs on the album, "All of Me" appears to be deeply personal to the artist. But being personal doesn't stop this track's language from being the most obscured with allusions to geography and possibly an allegory from a little-known Spanish play. ALL OF ME THINKS LESS OF YOU.  There's a debate   on Lyrics Genius about the meaning of this song, especially surrounding the identity of the only other character mentioned by name in this song, Manelich. Is he the one the song is about? Stevens has written vaguely about homosexual attraction throughout
Read more