Escaping the Creative Ghetto

My friend, Jake, blogged about this article. It's pretty great. Here's a quote that I liked alot:

Entertainment is best when it poses compelling questions, when it is not a lesson for the viewer but a dialogue with the viewer. A movie can show the ramifications of a worldview, but it gets in real trouble when it starts articulating worldviews. Christians will never have real success in Hollywood until we accept that simply delivering the Truth will not help the audience. We must allow the audience to wrestle with the Truth. We need to have the simple trust of the sower who casts seeds out on the ground and then moves on, believing that somebody else will come along to till, weed, and harvest.

Why is it that people of faith have so little faith in people?

This whole article could also be talking about music and the music industry. I realize it's still difficult for some people to grasp, but I'm encouraged that some one else is talking about it. Not to mention that this article is in Christianity Today. Hopefully, this will help CT's readers to better thinking.

"You're Beautiful" but this song still sucks!

"You're Beautiful
You're Beautiful
You're Beautiful, it's true.
I saw your face, in a crowded place
And I don't know what to do;
Cuz I'll never be with you." -James Blunt

These are the profound lyrics of the modern singer/songwriter. (GAG!!!)

I'm sorry, there has got to be SERIOUS payola going on somewhere for this song to be played on the radio so much. The guy looks like a serial killer, his voice is annoying, the melody to this song is amazing in its stupidity only because it is trumped in it's stupidity by those horrid lyrics.

Come on, those lyrics sound like something a sensitive 6th grade boy would write in his first attempts to write a song/poem and realized he could rhyme "face" and "place". (no offense to sensitive 6th grade boys)

The real question is "why this guy"? There are hundreds of great singer/songwriters who have put out their first records this past year and there have got to be artists/songs that are better than this idiot. I mean, I can name half a dozen singer/songwriters with brand new records that make this guy sound like the no-talent loser he is. (off the top of my head, I'm thinking that rhett miller and glenn phillps and bruce springsteen have all put out new solo albums recently, how come none of them are getting played once an hour?)

Holly's radio woke me up this morning and this dumb-ass song was playing. I may need to take some kind of anger management class for when I hear hear it.

powerplay

Today, I ended up going to a funeral. I debated with myself all morning on whether or not I should go, and ultimately decided that if I thought maybe I should, then I should.

So, I was rushing around to get ready, got stuck in traffic and construction and behind slow people all the way to the church, and running late.

Of course, when I got there, there was no place to park. So, after driving around for a little bit, I parked in a little parking area that's actually across the street from the church. The parking lot was actually for a little law firm that's right across the street from the church, but I'd seen two other cars do it while I was searching. They didn't have any signs posted saying "this parking lot for our customers only" or anything like that, and on top of everything else, there were plenty of open spaces in their lot.

Well, as soon as I parked and got out, a lady came charging out saying that I can't park there and that was going to have to tell those two other cars they can't park there either... Like I know who those cars belong to. right...

Keep in mind, i was already annoyed for being late. I couldn't help but tell the lady, "It's a funeral..." as I got back in my van and pulled it over and parked on the church's lawn.

Now, I don't know who that lady was. I don't know if she's like a receptionist or a legal assistant or one of the lawyers of the firm. I don't know if she decided to walk out into the parking lot on her own or if a boss told her to.

But, I so wanted to go in there after the funeral and say:

"Look...it's not the law. You don't have signs posted. There were still empty parking spots in the lot. Yes, it may have been within your rights to tell people to get off your parking lot. But, are your rights so significant that you couldn't have just a little bit of human compassion? Are your rules so important that you had to intrude upon people as they mourn the passing of a 6 year old boy?"

argh. I'm getting all fired up again just thinking about it.