Explosions in the sky

I love going to live shows. There's something thrilling about seeing a band live. Especially when that band is epic. Epic like Explosions in the Sky. They're an instrumental band from Texas, USA, and, man, I thought their albums were epic...right, if you have spotify (which i love...) search Explosions in the Sky and listen to the album ‘The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place’ as you read this.

Webster’s Dictionary states that the word epic means “extending beyond the usual or ordinary”. Exactly! (hold onto that). I got into this band while I was in High School some years ago and when I heard they were coming to Belfast I was completely stoked. I’ve had a great year of experiencing some excellent music (Bob Dylan, Death Cab for Cutie, Devotchka!) but Explosions in the Sky were by-far the most epic of them all. Yes, i swooned when Ben Gibbard came on stage, but my jaw dropped when the lead guitarist from Explosions in the Sky fell to his knees and starting slamming his fist into the guitar strings to make this muted crashing noise (you had to be there…). I literally, no word of a lie, stood there, mouth gaping. I was shocked. In awe. not only was it the noise this guy was making but the fact that he was pouring with sweat, on his knees rocking out like his life depended on it.

I’ve always wondered if musicians like their own music, and that night I found out they do. These guys thoroughly enjoy the music they make. You can just tell. Right. Now turn the volume up if you haven’t already. These guys are best enjoyed loud. Really loud. I had ringing in my right ear for 4-days after this show. You couldn’t hear anything else. At one point the bass was so low and so loud that the inside of my stomach shook and I kind of felt like puking (hey, I’m just being honest).

The band consists of 4 guys. They haven’t toured in 10 years, but I guess felt like they needed to. I am so glad they did. I have never enjoyed music so much. The boys next to me all looked like they were having some sort of spiritual experience. It’s funny how we can be overtaken by music. How it speaks to our innermost being and does something. I often wonder what that something is and I have a theory. It’s common too, because you can see it happening to people. It’s incredibly evident when you go to a live show. You just have to take a look at people’s faces. Music is our common ground. 

Back to those boys I was standing beside. There were about 5 of them, probably about 18 years of age or so. As soon as an intro would start you would hear one of them yell “YES! THIS SONG SO ROCKS!” then, they would proceed to conduct the song with their hands or heads (or both). This happened every time. Now normally I would get slightly annoyed, but this time I totally understood. Epic music like this demands that you get excited and rock out with every song as hard as you can. One of the boys seemed to go into some sort of trance like state -swinging back and forth to the beat, and then bursting into a fit when the guitar broke into a different part of the song. The boys also high fived a lot, which I thought was cute, but then also made me think about how this music was bringing them together. They were excited together, and in awe together. Enter our common ground. I have probably very little in common with those boys except that we all agree that Explosions in the Sky are epic. They extend far beyond ordinary and beyond the usual, and they bring people together. Okay, so I’m going to make a slightly bizarre connection between epic music and God. It’s been a concept in my head for months now and i think Explosions in the Sky just made all things clear.

I was reading something the other day, the other day being weeks ago, and something being, Mark Driscoll…yea, Mark. In ‘Death by Love’, his book that explains the Gospel in such a way that you see how faceted Christ’s work on the cross really was, he talks about how all good things come from God. ALL good things come from God. In my understanding that means even if you don’t believe there’s a God and you do something good it’s still from God (sucka…) even if you don’t deserve it and you couldn’t care less about God, or maybe you do care and you receive something good, it’s from Him, ‘cause He’s awesome like that. He’s God. He can do whatever He wants, so why not? Explosions in the Sky= good music- good things are from God- their music comes from God. See my connection? For me this makes this band’s music make so much sense! There is something other worldly about their music. I’ve actually started reading my Bible to this album and it makes it as epic as the Bible should be.

By now possibly ‘The Only Moment We Were Alone’ should be playing. Imagine God making the world (humour me). Doesn’t that make sense? Music makes us emotional. Emotions are where what we know in our heads and what we believe in our hearts meet, and music is the outward expression of that connection, at least for me it is. Sometimes it’s writing, but for the sake of this article it’s music. I’ve had enough conversations with people about how music affects them that I think I can say music connects to our souls. I believe that the next step can be that it lifts our souls to God. Because it lifts our souls to God, and music is something to be shared it means that we can do it corporately, because music is accessible and easily shared. I think that’s one of the other reasons why we sing in church (I would love to have a service where there were no lyrics for the songs, but just pure melodies and see what happens). Singing together, or worshipping through music gives us common ground.  It builds community because we participate in music together. God’s very crafty in this way. I’ve been finding that everything leads back to community. I had community with those boys at a gig because we both love a particular epic band. God blessed Explosions in the Sky with epic music. Secretly God is bringing us together all the time…so Explosions in the Sky, thank you for being epic and helping my soul find God at the ‘Spring and Air Brake’ in Belfast.

Comments

Leah! I’m reading this in work, and trying not to smile, cos I’m supposed to be working!! Great post - I totally get what you mean about music connecting with your emotions, and common ground with other folk. Glad you had a God-experience to the sounds of Explosions in the Sky - sounds perfect!

By Emma Keenan. Posted on Tuesday 22nd Sep 2009 at 10:59

You’re so right about music connecting people and the way it stirs us.  Let there be more music in our lives

By Cathy Mowbray. Posted on Tuesday 22nd Sep 2009 at 11:01

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