Intro to Blindside
The past month I've been on a Blindside kick. Blindside is a rock band from Sweden that holds a special place in my heart. I'm sure everyone has a formative record from their youth; for me, that record is Silence by Blindside.
I don't remember exactly how or when I got into rock music, but I remember visiting my cousins in 2000 and rocking out to Linkin Park's album Hybrid Theory. Older guys in youth group shared the song "God of Elijah" from Disciple's album, By God. Christian metal? Guys yelling and screaming a story straight out of the Bible? I knew DC Talk's "Jesus Freak", but this was different somehow. I discovered East West's song "She Cries" from A Light in Guinevere's Garden through the late night rock segment that the Christian radio station hosted one Saturday a month. My youth pastor shared P.O.D.'s The Fundamental Elements of Southtown and Project 86's Drawing Black Lines with me. I remember anticipating the release of P.O.D.'s album Satellite, and asking my mom to take me out to buy it the week it released. Later, an email newsletter announced P.O.D.'s new 3 Points Records label and the first single "Pitiful" coming from the new album Silence by their friends in the Swedish band, Blindside.
The first concert I ever attended, I went to a festival in south Florida to see Blindside. Later, I met them at Cornerstone Orlando and asked them sign my album liner. Needless to say, Blindside was a very formative band in my teenage years.
About a Burning Fire 20th Anniversary
So, Blindside was recently visiting the US to play at Furnace Fest 2024. As announcements were made about the festival and they began to reveal exclusive merch, I started taking breaks from my endless audiobook listening to dive into the hype and revisit the hardcore music of my youth. A few weekends ago, Victoria and I drove out to the farm to get eggs and visit friends. We listened through the full Silence album. When we returned home, she started listening to the song "Silence" on repeat while finishing her homework (proud dad moment). I listened through About a Burning Fire because this year marks the 20th anniversary of the album. I began listening to The Great Depression, but was distracted. The Great Depression released when I was in college and is probably my favorite Blindside album, but I was curious about their final album.
With Shivering Hearts We Wait
With Shivering Hearts We Wait was the last album Blindside released in 2011. It was never my favorite Blindside album and I found myself wanting to listen and figure out why. What did I like (or not like) about it? I wanted to find out why I never really got into it. It felt musically disjointed to me. Some songs were too formulaic and pop-radio-friendly. Other tracks didn't flow smoothly from one to the next, as though a song was missing between them. I wasn't really intending to do a deep-dive, I just wanted to listen through the album.
It still wasn't a big hit for me, but a couple songs really spoke to me. I was first captured by the track "Our Love Saves Us", which includes the album's title-drop. I kept returning to the album for this song and wanted to share it with the Music Director at church. It had such a powerful worship theme, in my opinion. It had a dual meaning: collectively as Christians, our love of Christ saves us, or holding onto love in hard times saves a relationship through Christ. I think of the imagery of a triangle with Christ, husband, and wife at each vertex. The husband and wife at the bottom, grow closer together as they move closer to Christ at the top vertex of the triangle. As I thought about rating the track, it made me wonder how I would have rated the song years ago. Whatever I might have rated it in the past, it gets 5 stars for me now. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
While "Our Love Saves Us" is important in this story, it's not the main reason that I'm here today. As I kept returning to this album over a 2-week period, I kept finding different songs stuck in my head and drawing me back in. I began to pick up on a deep underlying story across the album. Some lines, like in "My Heart Escapes", seemed to reach out to me across time, such as "To meet you after this long time / Tells me I'm not that young".
Early tracks, like "Monster on the Radio" speak of sacrificing anything to be the monster on the radio. It feels like thoughts of a husband, perhaps cheating with work. Aspirations of an artist to be on the radio, thus becoming a monster because of what he put his family through for his own gain. Then "It's All I Have" speaks of time passing and love becoming routine as their family grows. Perhaps elements of post-partum depression as the chorus encourages his wife to wear a bracelet of joy and necklace of peace. Then, "Bloodstained Hollywood Ending" tells of a packed suitcase and an airport chase scene trying to keep a partner from leaving. The ice cold in their relationship and being tired of tiptoeing around the promises made as their romance becomes a "bloodstained Hollywood ending." That's followed by "Our Love Saves Us", which tells of the hardship of working through love, "With shivering hearts we wait / I'm still holding on." That's followed by "Bring Out Your Dead", which is almost a salvation story of exposing the skeletons in one's closet, letting them go, and asking for forgiveness and healing. The story continues through each track and it's been amazing to discover.
Oct 20th, 2024 - Bring Out Your Dead
I sat down to write this blog on Oct 20th because of the track "Bring Out Your Dead". (lyrics)
"Bring Out Your Dead" follows "Our Love Saves Us" and is another song with multiple possible interpretations. In ways, it's a come to Jesus moment of cleaning the skeletons out of your closet. I think it's also a heartfelt confession between a husband and wife. It's a catchy song and kept getting stuck in my head over the past week, as I'd sing along "bring out, bring out your dead." Friday (Oct 18), I pulled out the album booklet and was reading the lyrics. Today, it's the first verse that caught my attention. "Heavy like a thousand pounds / What if I told you now / To carry the smell of death is harder than it sounds"
This morning (Oct 20), while waiting during the kids' piano lessons, I was catching up on a sermon I missed a few weeks ago when we went to New York. Sep 18, Vision Wins (Pt3): Answer the Call. Pastor Ben defines and differentiates God's calling and God's will, and then quickly tells the story of Jonah who was called to be a prophet, but fought God's will for him to go to Ninevah. At the end, he commented on Jonah being swallowed by the fish and asked how we want to answer God's call. "Are you answering the call and showing up in God's grace smelling like grace? Or are you showing up smelling like wickedness and sin and death and darkness?"
God put this album in my heart over the past month. He put 'Bring Out Your Dead' in my head this week, preparing for me to catch up on this message from mid-September. I looked up the lyrics on Friday in preparation for relating it to this message. The difficulty of finding "Who am I without my skeleton friend?" The chorus reveals how confessing our dark secrets feels like suicide (dying to self). Near the end they identify the pain caused to others in the bridge, "When I let this corpse out / He will bite your soul / It will make you bleed" and asks for forgiveness, "When I let this corpse go / Will you do the same, will you let him go?"
The song reminds me of a moment in "The Great Divorce" by C. S. Lewis when a man is carrying a sort of lizard that is on fire and burning the man (if I remember correctly). An 'angel' offers to kill the lizard, promising that the man will be happier if it's gone, but it will only act if that's what the man truly wants. Then man says he could get rid of the lizard at any time, but he's had him around for so long that it's not worth the bother of killing it. It is an allegory for the harms caused by lust.
In the liner notes, lead singer Christian thanks "Jesus Christ for choosing to have your healing heart beat so close to my bruised one. Thank you my wonderful wife Elina for holding my hand through sunshine and rain." Guitarist, Simon, ends his thanks with "Lord, keep my heart shivering of anticipation for the holy spirit. I'm a better man when I'm close to You. Amen"
Another funny thing about listening to this album. When it finishes, my music player automatically automatically loops back to Blindside's first album and the track "Invert" which has a line that screams "Glad you came to my senses, 'cause I didn't."
When you can't escape and you're not sure you'd want to if you could...
As I drift in and out of Blindside albums, I find so many meaningful lines. There are so many lyrics that catch my attention and as I dig deeper, I find only Christ. It's been inspirational in so many ways that I can't explain.
"Eye of the Storm" (lyrics) from About a Burning Fire feels like it describes my life.
Please come closer
Cause my heart doesn't touch Yours anymore
Please see I'm walking into the eye of the storm
And I'll still come out loving You even more
"Ask Me Now" (lyrics) from The Great Depression describes Christ bringing us our lost smile
And so one morning just before dawn You came
Out of the forest towards my window
With a smile in Your hand
As the moist air up to Your knees started swirling like smoke
I saw Your lips move
Asking: Did you lose something
I stood glued to the window
Emotions running through my veins
How I know a word I can’t explain
I think I've known You all along
Just lost Your face in the crowd for a while
I think I have been holding my breath all my life
Can I exhale and go into exile
Ask me now and I’ll run away with You
How that "face in the crowd" ties back to themes from the album Silence and the opening track "Caught a Glimpse" (lyrics). When the noise of the world is overwhelming, a "Still silent voice whispers stay / (But in the crowd I) / Caught a glimpse of your eye" reminding me that that "I'll be safe and devotion." "Pitiful" (lyrics) follows after, with another confession:
But I know, as I hammered those nails into Your beautiful hands
Your eyes still try to search for mine, but I look away
Now Your eyes are the only thing that can save me
I'm still so afraid of them piercing
You're breaking into my prison,
And I remember every word You said
Come back in time, come back
And I remember I would soon be dead
Now so pitiful, so pitiful
You're so pitiful
"When I Remember" (lyrics) closes out The Great Depression with a confession of what can break through our hardened hearts:
These days there is not much that will bring tears to my eyes
But when I remember who I am and who You are
When I remember
A cloud moves in, rain falls, thunder strikes
And sunshine breaks through the clouds
I can cry out of sorrow and joy
Every drop of rain turns into a crystal in the sun
So wash my eyes, my clothes, my skin, my bones, my soul
My feet, my love
I’m not forgotten
I’m in your thoughts cause I feel sunshine in the rain
And the title track "About a Burning Fire" (lyrics) closes that album describing Christ's rebellious love in our selfish world:
Love is destructive
For the ego
And Your voice is the only thing
That speaks rebelliously in this world of claiming your own
There is no peace outside if there's nothing within
Love is addictive
For the spirit
And Your voice whispers with a roar
That fire rises up, refills
Place the right king on the throne
I thought about fire in the sky
I thought about fire
I thought about love burning in Your eye
I thought about fire
I thought about a burning fire
I thought about a loving fire
I thought about Your love
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