My Fav 5 Albums

I know FB has the same dumb quiz, but I wanted to give a brief explanation. To make the top 5, I chose albums that, start to finish had great songs both musically and lyrically. Some of my favorite artists didn't make the cut, simply because they didn't have strong enough albums (too many "dud" songs cluttered up the gems).

So without further ado:

5) John Mayer, Try!

This is a live album, so I don't know if that's cheating but it is Mayer at his best: dropping the gimmicky "sensitive guy" thing and just shredding some blues guitar. You forget as you listen that this is only a power trio playing they're so good. The highlight is when Mayer covers/reinvents a Kanye West song.

4) Jimmy Eat World, Bleed American

They self-titled this album after 9/11, but luckily that's all they changed. This album runs the gamut from hard rocking emo/punk to melancholy ballads and this band pulls it off so well. I survived a mind-numbing job in a factory by singing these songs to myself all day long. By far their best album to date.

3) Ray LaMontagne, Trouble

Wow, this dude can sing. Before you hear Ray you need to see a picture of him. You will then be baffled by how a voice so smooth can come from such a scruffy looking nerf-herder. This is a really beautiful album that feels very simple, yet actually has plenty of instruments playing on it. The songs feel spacious and comfortable at the same time.

2) Dashboard Confessional, A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar

So I'm a recovering emo kid, I guess. Chris Carrabba ditches the weepy guitar ballads for a full band and the result is phenomenal. Incredibly interesting musically and the drummer is so underrated (he's in the top 5 for me). Anything that Carrabba sings you get the feeling that he absolutely means it. So good.

1) Foo Fighters, The Colour and The Shape

My wife thinks this music is "too angry" (and Grohl certainly screams/yells a lot), and it may be but it certainly hits you in the face and rarely lets up from track to track. No one rocks harder and the Foos have never made an album this completely good since. There's more guitar riffs layered here than a wedding cake and holy cow the drums! Grohl did all of them himself and ten years later, I still can't play the fills on "Everlong" right (they're that hard). Don't even get me started on "My Hero"...

There you have it. Now I'd love to hear your top 5 albums!

Oh Snap! C.S. Lewis Burns the Apostle Paul

If Clive Staples and I hung out at pubs, I would be very tempted to pull an Affleck (a la Good Will Hunting) and constantly be bragging: "Our boy's WICKED SMAT!"

His latest epiphany-inducing, theological uppercut for me is in Reflections on the Psalms. In a particular chapter, Lewis is talking about the subject of the Bible being "God's Word". He makes a pretty important distinction that the Bible is not like God reciting a story to a man, which he records verbatim (as he hurriedly tries to keep up).

"Uh, sorry God I zoned out there for a second...how many loaves and fishes were there?"

But rather God chooses to bring us His Word through humans - in spite of humans, really. And by God choosing to work through flawed (sinful) humans, we're left with Psalms that start out praising God then quickly switch to praying that God will "get even" with everyone that has wronged the psalmist (that doesn't seem very forgiving...). All throughout Scripture there are these dashes of humanity, these brushstrokes of a sinful creature, yet somehow still contained within God's message to us.

But here's where he burns Paul:

"I cannot be the only reader who has wondered why God, having given him so
many gifts, withheld from him (what would to us seem so necessary for the first
Christian theologian) that of lucidity and orderly exposition."

Oh snap! Basically, why can't Paul concisely get to the point and articulate himself a bit better? Lewis would argue that is simply a sign of God's modus operandi: He just loves the challenge of working with sinful man. He can use us in spite of us to get His message to us.

I really encourage you to check this book out and particularly this section. I probably have made a very unlucid attempt at explanation here. Sorry C.S.

Next time we go out, I'll buy you a pint.