The Philosophy of Music

Music is music. But what is music beyond that? Music itself is natural sounds of beauty through arrangements of harmonies and melodies in certain frequency ranges and timings. Music is used to express what so often, words can not express. But many songs have words that go to them. This is because songs lyrics are essentiall poetry, most times, and poetry is a way of deeply expressing words- perhaps the most powerful way to express words. The words and the music go together to tell a story, support a philosophy, and tell of the deep emotions of life.

And largely, the music can be played to where one can identify with the emotion or philosophy presented. Some of this may be absolute and some may be relatively based on culture. Rap and heavy metal may get someone pumped up and wanting to fight, while classical music may help someone relax and concentrate. There are times we need to fight, and there are times we need to relax. There are times we want spiritual war, times we want physical war, and times we want no war at all. There is a large sense of propriety we are missing in society today. It is not good to so much be against any sort of music, but we should know how to put them in their proper place- and all music, at least as far as Christians go- should be consistent within a Christian worldview.

And most people's music will be consistent within their worldview, and if not, then they contradict themselves, and destroys what is considered to be the dignity of music. When people sing songs or write songs that are against their pressuppositions, or that are not relative to their life, the dignity of music is destroyed. Each person has a pressupposition and philosophy behind their music.

And Reckless Abandon identifies itself with those of the same general philosophy behind the music- both musically and, especiall, lyrically. It is hard to directly quote from our overall pressupposition to this universe in every song- though we can get to the general core of it through songs directly about the pressupposition itself- that is, Christianity. But the general and imidiate philosophy behind the music of Reckless Abandon is that the songs played is songs that fit into the overall worldview of Christianity in songs about our own lives. It is songs about good people who are misrepresented. Songs about the deep emotions that many people feel, but have not heard it due to the disgrace-of-dignity in modern music. We play songs that identify to the line in Lynyrd Skynyrd's song, "Freebird" that says, "If I leave here tommorow, would you still remember me?" It is songs that tell us the haunting fact that "All I can do is think about them times, and ponder on what might have been" (The Absolute of Love- Ryan Hampton). It is about constantly and consistently writing songs, even against the tide.

For this reason, Reckless Abandon considers Ronnie Van Zant, the founder, and once lead-singer of Lynyrd Skynyrd, to be one of its musical, particularly lyrical, icon and inspiration. He wrote of the "concrede slowly creeping," and asked the Lord to "Take me and mine before that comes." Ironically, not long after the song was written, about half of the band, including Van Zant, was killed in a plane crash.

All of this is to say, that behind every song you will hear from Reckless Abandon, has a meaning and philosophy behind it. It may be a simple song, but even yet, it shows support to that life in some form or fashion. Also take heed to remember that the band is filled of sinful people. Writing songs about sin does not mean that the band supports sin- it may show the regret to it, and a plea for grace.

So remember that any song written is written from our philosophy and our view of the dignity of music. "You may not like my music or the words that go to it, but I think you can relate if you start with me" (Calling in Life- Ryan Hampton). The past is important- "For at last I have found the past and thus eternity" (Calling in Life- Ryan Hampton. You will be finding out soon, as our demo CD comes up- hopefully finished before Christmas. For now, I will leave you with this moving song:



"A brief candle- both ends burning, and endless mile, a bus wheel turning. A friend to share a lonesome time, a handshake, and a sip of wine. Say it loud, and let it ring, that we're all apart of everything. The future, the present, and the past- fly on proud bird...You're free at last." -Charlie Daniels