All-Time Greatest Hits  |  Lynyrd Skynyrd

              release date:  2000              record label:  MCA        
(songs recorded between 1972-1977)                                                        

track listing:  1) Tuesday’s Gone*
                       2) Sweet Home Alabama
                       3) Gimme Three Steps
                       4) Simple Man
                       5) Saturday Night Special
                                                                              6) Swamp Music
                                                                              7) The Ballad of Curtis Loew  
                                                                              8) Free Bird (studio version)*
                                                                              9) Call Me the Breeze
                                                                            10) Comin’ Home
                                                                            11) Gimme Back My Bullets
                                                                            12) What’s Your Name?
                                                                            13) You Got That Right
                                                                            14) All I Can Do Is Write About It
                                                                            15) That Smell
                                                                                                              * not included on original release

                                                                     “Tuesday’s gone, with the wind…”

The other night, I was flipping channels, when I stumbled upon Jay Leno’s Tonight Show.  In the ever-waging late night wars, I proudly fly the flag of Jimmy Fallon.  But with more than an hour before he would take the air, I lingered as Leno brought out his first guest, actor Charlie Sheen.  Sheen, as most of you can remember, was fired from his hit prime-time comedy Two and a Half Men for being, well, insane.  The few months that followed are the definition of a public relations nightmare.  Mr. Sheen went through a very high-profile meltdown, which culminated in the posting of several bizarre online videos in which he blasts his former bosses, speaks of drinking tiger’s blood, and “winning.”  For weeks, Charlie Sheen was a train wreck that no one could avoid. 

Eventually, Sheen worked through his problems and has recently landed another acting job on an upcoming sitcom.  That night, Leno began his interview with Sheen by noting the cheers of approval from the crowd and remarking that “Americans will accept anything but hypocrisy.”  Turning to Sheen, he continued, “the one thing you are not is a hypocrite… you always said, ‘I like girls,’ ‘I like to party,’ and I think that’s why people rolled with you through this [turbulent year].”

Thirteen albums into my quest to listen to (and then write about) every album on iPod, I have come face-to-face with my own hypocrisy.  In my original post (which you can find here), I decried a culture that no longer has time to listen to entire albums, instead choosing to purchase only singles from online outlets such as iTunes.  I felt as if I soared above this practice until I came across the next album on my iPod, All-Time Greatest Hitsby Southern-rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd.  It forced me to hold up a mirror and see, in myself, the problem that I condemned in others.  But, if there is to be redemption, it must come through confession – so here goes.  All-Time Greatest Hits, in my opinion, didn’t live up to its name.  So I changed it.  Edited it, until it became the record I wanted it to be.  I added songs through purchasing them from iTunes, and removed a track I didn’t like.  Funny how my self-righteous tones diminish when I start preaching to myself.  But more on that later.  

I didn’t grow up a Skynyrd fan.  My little hometown in central Kentucky had two high schools.  I graduated from the city school.  We fancied ourselves a strange mixture of top-40 popular kids, punk rock outcasts, and hip-hop street thugs.  In actuality, we were none of the above, but we thought ourselves mighty tough.  On the other side of town was the county school.  We city folks knew that the kids over there were nothing but rednecks, listening to country music and flying their rebel flags high.  Lynyrd Skynyrd was associated with the county school, so I didn’t have much to do with the classic rock icons.  (It’s funny, or maybe sad, how we draw lines in the sand to separate “them” from “us,” even at such a young age.)

Ironically, in college, I dated one of those “redneck” girls from the county school.  She helped expand my musical taste beyond three chord punk-rock anthems.  Janis Joplin,  Bob Seger, and Skynyrd were always in her CD player.  I didn’t mind Janis, and I warmed up to Seger pretty quickly – but I fought against Skynyrd as long as I could.  I didn’t want to like their music.  First, I objected to them on the grounds that I was raised a Neil Young fan.  His 1970 release, After the Gold Rush, contained a song entitled Southern Man, in which Young decried Southern racism.  Sweet Home Alabama, easily Skynyrd’s most popular song, was written as a counter-attack to Young’s song.  In my justice-driven mind, I equated choosing Skynyrd over Young as tantamount to supporting racism over equality.  Secondly, and I’m not proud to admit this, but I judged Skynyrd based upon their fan base, which I perceived to be party-hungry frat boys and beer-guzzling NASCAR fans – and I wasn’t interested in joining the ranks of either.  Even before I gave Skynyrd’s music a chance, I had decided not to like them.

But then, I listened to them.  I fought it as long as I could, but the music of the Southern-rockers eventually wore me down.  It was too good to dismiss, and too important to judge unfairly.  When I listened to Sweet Home Alabama with impartial ears, I didn’t hear racism, but boys who didn’t want an outsider (like Young, a Canadian) to judge them.  If I’m honest, the same thing happens to me when outsiders turn their nose up at my beloved home state as being “backward,” or full of people who “don’t wear shoes and only eat fried chicken.”  In fact, Young and Ronnie Van Zant, lead singer and principal songwriter for Skynyrd, were actually close friends.  Young wrote a song for Skynyrd, while Van Zant was seen numerous times, most notably on the cover of Skynyrd’s Street Survivors album, wearing a Young t-shirt.  Luckily, the choice between Young and Skynyrd isn’t an “either/or.”  As for the idea that Skynyrd wrote only light-weight, party music – nothing could be further from the truth.  Of course, they have songs like Sweet Home Alabama, Call Me the Breeze, and What’s Your Name which seem to extol the virtues of riotous living, but to assume that the band has nothing of significance to say is nonsense.  Just a cursory listen to Skynyrd’s songs prove otherwise.  In Saturday Night Special, a song which decries violence, Van Zant peaches that guns “ain’t good for nothin’ / but put a man six feet in a hole.”  On That Smell, the band tackles the issue of substance abuse, “the angel of darkness is upon you / stuck a needle in your arm / so take another toke / have a blow for your nose / one more drink, fool, will drown you.”  The Ballad of Curtis Loew finds the band daring to place value in a man whom the rest of society has rejected, “people said you was useless / but them people all were fools” and  Simple Man, one of my favorite songs by Skynyrd, is full of worthwhile knowledge passed from a mother to her growing son, “take your time, don’t live too fast / troubles will come and they will pass / and don’t forget son, there is Someone up above.”  Much to my excitement, I found that my premature judgments of the music of Ronnie Van Zant and company were completely off-base.  Skynyrd was about so much more than just drinking music.

After deciding it was past time that I embraced Lynyrd Skynyrd, I went out looking for an album to add to my collection.  Problem was, I couldn’t find one that included all the songs I wanted.  I had only had three requirements:  the album had to have 1) Simple Man, 2) Tuesday’s Gone (which, on a side note, has to be one of the best songs ever – heartbreak and trains, it don’t get much better than that) and 3) the studio version of Free Bird (I know, everyone likes the live version better – except me).  Problem was, I couldn’t find that combination.  So I took matters into my own hands.  All-Time Greatest Hits included Simple Man, but its version of Free Bird was live and Tuesday’s Gone was nowhere to be found.  Luckily for me, a Skynyrd album that my brother purchased at Goodwill did have the studio version of Free Bird – so, on my iPod, I made the first change to the All-Time Greatest Hits album by removing the live version of Free Bird and replacing it with the studio recording.  My freshmen year of college, Coca-Cola was running a promotion that printed an iTunes code, redeemable for one song, on the bottoms of winning Coke caps.  I drank a Coke a day until I became a winner, rushed home, and promptly spent my winning cap on Tuesday’s Gone, adding it to the All-Time Greatest Hits album on my iPod.  Of course, changing an album so that it contains the songs I want makes me, at least to some degree, a music hypocrite.  But, at least, the album now lived up to its name. 

Great art has the ability to transport its beholder.  So often, a song, a painting, or a sunset has created a story in my mind.  Sometimes I attempt to record them; other times, I just delight in watching them unfold.  A few years ago, I had the idea to create something I would call a M.A.E. – a multisensory artistic experience.  The idea was to utilize music, writing and photography to tell a common story.  For me, Tuesday’s Gone has always been a work art that has transported me into the middle of a story: its opening lines take me to a train track, a broken heart, and a grey fall sky.  Over two years ago, I tried to record the story that Tuesday’s Gone crafts in my mind every time I hear it.  A few weeks ago, I finally had the courage to try my hand at photography.  A finally, after days of putting it together, my first M.A.E., years in the making, has been completed.  I hope it has the ability to transport you to that train track, to that broken heart, and to the grey fall sky as well.  

Access my first M.A.E. here - Tuesday's Gone.  

               Again, for the First Time  |  Bleach 

        release date:  2002              record label:  Tooth and Nail

track listing:  1) Intro
                       2) Baseline     
                       3) Celebrate
                       4) Broke in the Head
                       5) We are Tomorrow
                       6) Fell Out
                                                                              7) Weak at the Knees
                                                                              8) Found You Out
                                                                              9) Said a Lot
                                                                            10) Almost Too Late 
                                                                            11) Andy’s Doin’ Time
                                                                            12) Knocked Out
                                                                            13) Jenn’s Song

                                                                “All that I’ve done, I hope that it counts…”

My youngest brother, Joseph, was born on August 29th, 1989, in Lexington, KY.  Every year, as the summer begins to wind down, my family searches for birthday presents, my mother purchases a cake, makes a big meal, and gathers a slew of family and friends together to celebrate.  And like clockwork, one story gets retold, year in and year out.  The time that I, his oldest brother, ruined his birthday.   

Like everyone else, I have my fair share of character flaws, but one tends to rival all others in intensity:  my lack of foresight.  Making plans has never been my strong suit.  In my excitement, I ignore flaws obvious to most anyone else.  Literally, every trip I go on finds me arriving at the destination without something crucial:  a toothbrush, deodorant, shoes.  On a trip to Florida with my cousin, I forgot to pack underwear. 

In the fall of my sophomore year at the University of Kentucky, I heard about a concert in Nashville.  I was dead set on attending.  Having recently gotten a job, I scrapped together enough money to order a ticket.  As the weeks passed, and the day of the show grew closer, my anticipation hit a fever pitch.  In my single-minded excitement, however, I had failed to recognize two glaring problems.

First, I would be attending the concert alone.  Not usually a problem, except in this case, as the ever-dutiful student within me planned on driving back to school after the show.  I didn’t want to miss classes Friday morning.  Somehow, the seven-hour round trip didn’t faze me.  Second, and most important, the day of the concert also happened to be the day that my little brother was brought into this world.  Learn from my mistakes:  if you plan to miss your fifteen-year-old brother’s birthday party for a concert, you should tell him before the party. 

I arrived at my parent’s house the afternoon of the concert, proud of myself for leaving enough time to at least see my brother on his special day; he was lucky to have such a thoughtful older brother.  After singing “Happy Birthday,” the family sat down for a huge dinner.  Finishing my food quickly, I got up from the table and announced that I had to leave. Every face in the room turned toward me, varying degrees of shock and surprise on each of them.  You’d have thought I had just crowned myself the king of Narnia.  I hadn’t anticipated this.  I started to blush.  Naturally, my brother asked why.

“I’m going to a concert,” I answered matter-of-factly. To say I was unprepared for his reaction would be an understatement.     

“A concert?”

“Uh, yeah,” I replied sheepishly. 

“On my birthday?!”

I was almost beginning to feel guilty about it.  Almost. 

“It’s their last show.  Ever.” 

My father raised an eyebrow,  “Who’s playing?”

“Bleach.”

My brother shook his head in disbelief. 

“Bleach?!”

I thought my family had gathered to celebrate my brother’s birthday, but from their appalled stares, I was beginning to wonder if they had assembled to prevent me from attending the show.  I was beginning to feel desperate. “They’re my favorite band… it’s their last show!” I said again, to no one in particular. 

“Where is this concert?” my mother asked.  With my answer, I could see the worry begin to move across her face.  “Is anyone going with you?”

I shook my head.

“Son, you will fall asleep at the wheel and die on the side of the road.”

Mom’s a worrier. 

I reminded everyone, for what seemed like the tenth time, that this was Bleach’s final show.  “I have to be there!” 

My mother proceeded to speak words that shook me to the core.

“Well, then I’m going with you.”

Simultaneously, my brother and I blurted out the same response:  “What?!”

“Its my birthday!”

“MOM!  I’m eighteen!  I think I can drive myself to Nashville!”

Thirty minutes later, I was riding in a minivan.  And I was not alone. If you’re going to skip your little brother’s birthday for a concert, and you don’t tell him ahead of time, at least have the decency not to rob him of his mother as well.   

Every year, on August 29th, when the story gets retold, those unfamiliar with the tale question me, an air of righteous indignation in their voices.

“You missed your brother’s birthday for a concert?”

Seven years later, it still shocks me that no one will accept my answer. 

“It was their last show!” 

Two years prior to that fall afternoon – almost to the day – Bleach released their fourth studio album:  Again, for the First Time.  The group broke onto the Christian music scene in 1996 with their debut album, Space, but it was their second and third albums, Static in 1998 and Bleach in 1999, that cemented Bleach as a mainstay in the Christian music industry.  Not bad for a band birthed at a little college in eastern Kentucky.  As 1999 came to a close, Bleach’s stock seemed to be rising by the day; critics and fans alike were certain the band was destined for even greater things.  And then, seemingly overnight, Bleach disappeared. 

Fans eagerly awaited a new album and another tour, but years passed with no word from the band.  Behind the scenes, the foundation was crumbling, as members were lost to other pursuits.  By 2000, the band comprised of five friends from Kentucky Christian University had been whittled down to only two:  Davy Baysinger, lead vocalist and principal songwriter, and guitarist Sam Barnhart.  The duo were forced to confront a difficult question:  was this the end of Bleach? 

It took three years for fans to get an answer to that question, but in August of 2002, Bleach burst back onto the scene with a new album, three new members, and a new lease on life.  Brothers Milam and Jared Byers took over lead guitar and percussion duties, while Jerry Morrison and his bass guitar completed the new lineup.  It was nothing short of a rebirth.  Once facing the end of their musical dreams, the members of Bleach remerged with Thoreau’s passion to seize the day, live deliberately and “suck the marrow out of life.”  The new set of songs were loud, rowdy and fun, but at the same time, deeply personal and reflective.  Bleach, at once, had grown up and learned to let loose – the result was something truly magical. 

Again for the First Time, the world’s reintroduction to a reborn Bleach, begins with a track aptly titled Intro.  An instrumental piece, lasting all of eighteen seconds, it provides a perfect complement to the raucous mixture of rock, pop and punk to come.  The band jumps into its new sound with Baseline.  Clearly excited about being back where they belong, Davy sings “bring back / bring back the baseline / I think it’s about that time / I can’t afford to miss / I was made for this.”  The party continues with Celebrate, a love letter which could equally have been written to a significant other, a band, or the God who “makes all things new.”  With the boys backing him, Davy’s joy overflows: “I celebrate the day / that I met you / the impossible is possible / the unthinkable is coming true.” 

But life isn’t all celebrations.  On Again, for the First Time, Bleach gives significant time to exploring the rollercoaster that is human relationships.  Most everyone can identify with the situation chronicled in Broke in the Head, “you haven’t said a single thing / the whole way home / the air is thick with awkward silence / so you turn up the radio,” or the description of heartache in Fell Out:  “what’s wrong with me / I just been layin’ around / wishin’ it’d be like it was before I fell out / now is there any chance, that I can find romance / like we had back then, oh, I want it again.” 

But Bleach is ready to offer something drastically missing from most songs about heartache:  hope.  In Weak at the Knees, Davy describes a dire situation by singing that “this hole is big / and my light is starting to burn out,” but for Bleach, darkness is never the end.  By the conclusion of that same song, the band has found the will to carry on:  “I won’t let go cause something inside me is saying hold on / just for one more night / I can’t explain it, but something is tell me its alright / it’s alright / You found me.”  Likewise, in Said a Lot, frustration with a friend surfaces, “makin’ friends so you can use them / that’s the way you pick and choose them… you said a lot of things this year / half of them untrue.”  But the boys in the band are unwilling to give up, the song ending with the promise “there is hope and I’m not jaded / my passion for this hasn’t faded / there is hope and it’s unchanging.” 

But nothing preaches hope quite like Knocked Out, a song that, at certain times in the past, has literally brought me to tears.  It begins, “how did I get here / all tied up … complacency has gotten the best of me / and the best of me is forgotten / beneath the sea of what I’ve become,” before going into the chorus, “all that I’ve done, I hope that it counts / I’d rather be knocked down / than to be knocked out.”  Who hasn’t, at times in their life, wondered if they were going to be able to get back up?  But hope finds us in the end, as it does with this song, with Davy definitely singing into the darkness, “I will sing at the top of my lungs / I will dance even if I’m the only one / and I hope that we’ll never be apart / and I will sing and I hope it heals my heart.”  That kind of hope changes things.     

Seven years after ruining my brother’s birthday and being chauffeured to Bleach’s last show by my mother, I have come to a realization:  were I put into that situation again, I would make the same decision.  Sure, I’d do things different the second time around –  I warn my family beforehand, and do much more to make my brother feel loved on his birthday, but seeing the closing chapter on a band that has meant so much to me was something that I’ll never forget.  Over a year after that concert, Bleach’s record label would release a double album entitled Audio / Visual, which contained a greatest hits-type retrospective of Bleach’s nine year career, as well as a DVD of their final concert.  A few years back, I remember reading an article about Nirvana’s Unplugged in New York album, the first record released after the suicide of frontman Kurt Cobain.  The writer of the article noted that, having attended the historic performance from which the album was recorded, he bought, but then never listened to the album.  For him, the memories of the live performance would be diluted by listening to the recording; the same is true for me in regards to the DVD of the Bleach farewell show.  I never watched it, because I lived it. 

No band has meant as much to me as Bleach.  The music, the honesty of the lyrics, the energy of the live shows, and the attitude of the band members make them unforgettable.  I lost count of how many times I saw Bleach live through high school and college – but what I do have are memories.  The time Davy climbed up the speaker towers and jumped off, into the loving hands of the mosh pit, inside a church in Wilmore.  When I got stuck in traffic on my way to see them at the Ichthus Christian Music Festival and didn’t make the show; when I finally arrived, a close friend presented me with a piece of wood autographed by each band member.  That last show in Nashville, and the fact that my mom was probably right – as soon as the show was over, I crawled into the passenger seat of her van and feel asleep, my mother driving the entire distance back home.  And every time, after each show, when the guys were gracious enough to stop and really talk to us.  There was a time when I saw the band so much that they began to recognize me.  What a shot of self-esteem for a high school student, to have his favorite band actually know him. 

Davy, Sam, Milam, Jared and Jerry – rest assured, all that you’ve done has counted.  Over and over and over again. 

Each time I write a new blog, I poke around the internet, researching it and the band.  I was going through this ritual with Again for the First Time, remembering my favorite band, when, completely by accident, I came across something that made me yell like a school girl: bleachisalive.com.

Apparently, the boys have one more rebirth in them; I couldn’t be more excited!