05 September 2005

Lessons Learned While Rocking Out at the Light

Saturday (9/3/05), I had the opportunity to attend an awesome concert. The strange thing about it is that despite the fact that it was the weekend, I actually learned some things.

I learned that people often make the mistake that Christian rock is not as heavy as secular rock. This is simply not true. One of my friends was working at a concession stand at the concert. I went up to buy some lunch and started talking about an awesome mosh pit I had been in. He kinda stared and said, "At Rock the Light?" His tone said, "At a Christian concert?" It seems that people still have Christian music set as a guy with a guitar singing praise songs and hymns. However, Christian rock concerts have mosh pits. I will let some of my readers (I very much doubt that I have many) pick their jaws up off of the floor. I have been told that Christian rock gets no respect because it has no musical merit and that it cannot possibly be heavy. Christian rock is still rock. It is very heavy, very energetic, and verily, verily, I say unto thee, it is very good. And the cool thing about it is that the heaviness comes straight from God. For interested in checking out some artists, you don't have to go very far. UnderOath, Relient K, Norma Jean, Blindside, MxPx, Emery, and Mae are all readily available and run the gammit from skater punk to indie to metal.

Another lesson is how little some people care for others. There was a striking contrast between the people who would actually stop dead in the middle of a mosh pit to help someone up and the people who would yell, "Get on with the show!" when a rep from World Vision was on stage pooring her heart out about the devastation of AIDS in Africa. What is even more shocking is that those yelling at the rep were the often the ones who would scream, "I love Jesus!" when prompted to do so. The "modern" Christian: faithful when it's fun (aka when a musician was on stage singing), not when it actually requirers something, such as doing "unto the least of these". Gee, I wonder who told us to do that.

Rock on.

1 comment:

Verbose said...

I would hold to that Contemporary Christian, guy with a guitar singing praise hymns, because I worked a "20: The Countdown Magazine" show at a radio station...actually, the time of this post, I think.

But my musical experiences are limited, just like everyone else, due to interests and whatnot.

As for the "how little people care," it is strange. I think some can be excused with "I got carried a way responses." Most I think would be reasoned out (although not excused) by "spiritual highs". When someone is telling you to praise God with a huge auditorium, one can get "high". When some music's going, one can get "high".

Not so much when someone's telling you to actually do something you don't have interest in, especially when it's something that requires things you don't like.