Pop's holy rollers

The Guardian has an article today on Pop's holy rollers which links Steve Arrington's retrospective‬ Double CD Way Out (80-84), Sheila E's autobiography The Beat of my Own Drum, and Chuck D's The Black in Man. Angus Batey writes that 'Many acts – from Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis to Marvin Gaye, Prince, Madonna and U2 – have struggled to reconcile the sacred with the profane in their art.' He suggests that if 'the musicians-turned-pastors (the likes of Arrington, Little Richard or Al Green) are the most head-turning examples of artists trying to accommodate their faith,' there are others like Sheila E for whom the process is less dramatic.

September has actually been a great month for new albums which explore spiritual themes with excellent new releases by Leonard Cohen, Deacon Blue, Robert Plant and U2.

Popular Problems by Cohen is his best since The Future and, as with that album, deals both explicitly and ambiguously with religious imagery and spiritual reflection: 'Word of Words / And Measure of all Measures / Blessed is the Name / The Name be blessed / Written on my heart / In burning Letters / That's all I know / I cannot read the rest.' ('Born in Chains')

Ricky Ross is in a rich vein of inspiration with The Hipsters in 2012 quickly followed by solo album Trouble Came Looking in 2013 and now A New House. Deacon Blue's best album since under-appreciated classic Whatever You Say, Say Nothing, both albums featuring songs centred on Bethlehem: 'I long to be there / As bright as the sky / At Bethlehem's gate' ('Bethlehem's Gate') and 'You got to go back, gotta go back, gotta go back in time / To Bethlehem / To begin again.' ('Bethlehem begins').

Robert Plant's Lullaby ... and the Ceaseless Roar is a wonderfully original melting pot of blues, country, indie and world influences. Somebody There explores a sense of the sublime: 'When I was a young boy / And time was passing by / Real slow / And all around was wonder / And all around the great unknown / With eyes that slowly opened / I set about the wisdom to know / And living out of language / Before one word I spoke / I heard the call / There is somebody there I know.'

Neil McCormick's initial reaction to U2's Songs of Innocence to me seems fairly accurate: 'I wouldn’t put it on a par with their greatest work - Boy, Joshua Tree, Achtung Baby or even the seamless songs of All That You Can’t Leave Behind ... But ... it certainly does the job it apparently sets out to do, delivering addictive pop rock with hooks, energy, substance and ideas that linger in the mind after you’ve heard them.' 'It is, at heart, a highly personal set of songs' with 'no flag waving anthems, no big social causes.' If there is a moral, he suggests, 'it appears in the coda of Cedarwood Road: “a heart that is broken / is a heart that is open.”'

More on some of these artists and the interplay between faith and music can be found in my co-authored book, The Secret Chord.

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Leonard Cohen - Born In Chains.