![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/162\/2013\/11\/danielamos.jpg\" "\\"danielamos\\"")
<\/a>Dedicated to Billy Corgan, who challenged Christians to \u201cmake better music\u201d and branch out beyond U2\u2019s musical blueprints in an interview with CNN in September. I challenge you to buy and bury yourself in this album, Billy; it sounds nothing like U2\u2014in fact, Daniel Amos <\/a>influenced U2<\/em>! <\/em><\/p>\nJust as the films Sunset Boulevard<\/em> and American Beauty<\/em> are narrated by dead men, so too is the Daniel Amos song \u201cNow That I\u2019ve Died.\u201d Unlike these undead narrators, however, the protagonist of the song is literally better off dead.<\/p>\n \u201cI lost my stiff, stiff neck and my hard, hard heart \/ my self-respect is off the charts,\u201d he sings. \u201cJust hanging out here on the Other Side \/ dead to my pride, now that I\u2019ve died.\u201d<\/p>\n The song simmers for most of its duration and ultimately reaches a boil. In five minutes, the band reimagines the resurrection life, and succeeds in clearing the clouds of harpists who spend all of eternity bored out of their God-fearing gourds.<\/p>\n \u201cNow That I\u2019ve Died\u201d is one of many highlights on Dig Here Said the Angel,<\/em> Daniel Amos\u2019s fourteenth proper studio recording in a career that spans almost forty years. To fund the record, the band launched a Kickstarter campaign in 2012, hoping to raise $14,000; fans donated over $32,000.<\/p>\n The result is my favorite album of 2013 thus far.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Dig Here Said the Angel<\/em> finds sixty-three-year-old frontman and lyricist Terry Scott Taylor exploring aging in relation to faith as one who knows he\u2019s no longer the spry, spring chicken who sang on Daniel Amos\u2019s self-titled debut in 1976. At the same time, he knows he isn\u2019t dead yet either\u2014and even when he does die, he apparently plans to live quite triumphantly.<\/p>\n Fans of Daniel Amos\u2019s Eagles-influenced \u201970s albums, the band\u2019s featherless, New Wave incarnation on the Alarma Chronicles<\/em> quadrilogy in the \u201980s, and 1993\u2019s Sgt. Pepper<\/em>-esque Motor Cycle<\/em> know that the band reinvents itself with each record. While Dig Here Said the Angel<\/em> finds Taylor and Co. evolving once again, it retains the essence of Daniel Amos. Ambitious, mischievous, at times menacing, and mercilessly melodic, the album calls to mind the works of The Beatles, Talking Heads, Elvis Costello, and Nick Cave, all while sounding exactly like none of those artists.<\/p>\n I find myself attracted to the gravity of this record\u2014not so much a heaviness as a sense of something dense and substantial. Each song deals with life, death, and life after death. Take, for example, \u201cThe Ruthless Hum of Dread.\u201d \u201cIn a pauper\u2019s field of dreams \/ I\u2019m walking in between open-mouthed graves \/ anxious to be fed,\u201d Taylor sings. \u201cAnd all my buried intentions are groaning for transition \/ in the raising of the dead.\u201d<\/p>\n But a joy comes with this thematic heaviness, and reminds me of when rainfall and sunshine coexist. Consider the effortless, effervescent \u201cJesus Wept.\u201d \u201cI found my masterpiece in the discount bin,\u201d Taylor sings. \u201cI pound against the wall of my ancient skin \/ crying \u2018Let me out!\u2019 \/ \u2018Let me out!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n God\u2019s response to this request? \u201cNo, not yet.\u201d<\/p>\n But suffering does not have the final word in \u201cJesus Wept.\u201d The lyric continues: \u201cThere\u2019s not a holy man who doesn\u2019t know grief well \/ or think the road to Heaven doesn\u2019t pass through Hell \/ they\u2019ve cried \u2018Let me out\u2019 \/ they\u2019ve heard \u2018No, not yet\u2019 \/ they know before he danced, Jesus wept.\u201d In Daniel Amos\u2019s capable hands, suffering becomes a dark bend in life\u2019s road en route to the New Jerusalem\u2014an inevitable, but finite stretch of hellish highway.<\/p>\n Another album highlight, \u201cThe Uses of Adversity,\u201d features a wonderfully wobbly bass line by Tim Chandler that onomatopoetically recalls the words of James 1:6, in which \u201cone who doubts is like a wave of the sea.\u201d Instead of attempting to oust doubt from its perch, Taylor embraces uncertainty in the song\u2019s lyric.<\/p>\n \u201cDon\u2019t send me rain if I bloom in drought,\u201d he sings. \u201cNo, don\u2019t send me certainty \/ if somehow it\u2019s best for me to doubt.\u201d For Taylor to write such a lyric\u2014or pray such a prayer, really\u2014is an act of trust; a vote of confidence in God\u2019s unorthodox methods.<\/p>\n In the song \u201cWe\u2019ll All Know Soon Enough,\u201d Taylor defines doubt as temporary\u2014another form of suffering that has a shelf life, expiring when we do. He sings the verses from the perspective of those who believe, but reconsider when other explanations for their circumstances seem easier to swallow.<\/p>\n As the band uncorks a combustible chorus, Taylor issues a response to these people: \u201cThere may be no Heaven, no, no, no \/ There may be no Hell, no \/ There may be no place to go \/ but we\u2019ll all know soon enough.\u201d He continues, \u201cIf what your mother said was true \/ though Old Testament and cruel \/ did she serve you one too many drinks of the hard, hard stuff? \/ Well, we\u2019ll all know soon enough.\u201d<\/p>\n When the world continually serves us slugs of the \u201chard, hard stuff\u201d\u2014the sort of suffering that sets us reeling\u2014belief in a benevolent God seems like an absurd proposition. Even Taylor cannot help but question the nature of God in \u201cThe Use of Adversity\u201d: \u201cMy God, my God, have you forsaken me \/ or is this grace disguised as adversity?\u201d<\/p>\n Although he initially echoes Christ\u2019s words on the cross, a part of him still trusts God, and wonders if his suffering might serve as a sacrament, drawing him nearer to his Maker. How many times, after all, do curses reveal themselves as blessings in hindsight?<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll all know soon enough,\u201d the song says. In the meantime, we will settle for the perspective of an undead narrator who can tell us what the view looks like from the Other Side. \u201cI\u2019m never cynical, but still a little sarcastic \/ by the way the cuisine here is pretty fantastic,\u201d Taylor sings on \u201cNow That I\u2019ve Died\u201d\u2014more like \u201cNow That I\u2019ve Lived\u201d if you ask me.<\/p>\n Chad Thomas Johnston<\/a> is a slayer of word dragons who resides in Lawrence, Kansas, with his wife Rebekah, their daughter Evangeline, and five felines. He is a regular contributor to\u00a0Image <\/em>Journal\u2019s \u201cGood Letters\u201d blog at Patheos.com. His writings have also appeared in\u00a0The Baylor Lariat<\/em>\u00a0and at CollapseBoard.com, home to ex-Melody Maker<\/em>\u00a0critic\/Nirvana-biographer Everett True. In May of 2013, eLectio Publishing released Johnston\u2019s writing debut,\u00a0a whimsical memoir titled Nightmarriage<\/em><\/a>. Dedicated to Billy Corgan, who challenged Christians to \u201cmake better music\u201d and branch out beyond U2\u2019s musical blueprints in an interview with CNN in September. I challenge you to buy and bury yourself in this album, Billy; it sounds nothing like U2\u2014in fact, Daniel Amos influenced U2! Just as the films Sunset Boulevard and American […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1054,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[544,66,545,155,546,3577],"class_list":["post-4607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chad-thomas-johnston","tag-daniel-amos","tag-death","tag-dig-here-said-the-angel","tag-doubt","tag-life","tag-music"],"yoast_head":"\n
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