Image courtesy of The Innocence Mission
For a lot of people, religion and music go together like sour cream and sweet chilli sauce. After all, music is just audible expression. Spirituality flows into music through the mind of the artist, and back out again through the mind of the listener. Religious music isn’t always, but can certainly be mainstream enough that it breaches religious communities and becomes part and parcel of wider society. Sufjan Steven; a Timber & Steel favourite explores his faith in fantastic self-exploratory depth, and there is absolutely no doubt that he has written some of the most poignant pieces of music ever to reach my ears. So why do I have such an unrelenting hang-up about religious music, and why does my subconscious reject some artists and not others? It’s probably obvious by now that I am not a religious person. I am an atheist. I respect people’s faith and desperately wish my brain was wired in such a fashion which would allow it to unquestioningly believe convenient teachings. Alas, it is not. What I’ve come to realise recently is that there are two kinds of religious music, and the difference between the two lies in the motives.
Type 1) Extrospective Religious Music- Music which is made with the effect it will have on the listener in mind. Whenever I listen to this style of music, I inevitably feel like it is trying to sell me a faith, and I avoid it like the plague. It seems so dishonest and manipulative. The Welcome Wagon, an indie-folk two piece comprised of Reverend Thomas Vito Aiuto and his wife, is just about where the line is drawn for me. Their album, which was produced by Sufjan Stevens incidentally, is filled with fantastic folk music that I only just feel comfortable listening to. It isn’t confrontingly preachy, but it is lyrically wound around religious teachings, rather than the human experience of that faith.
Type 2) Introspective Religious Music- Music which is fathered by religious faith, but is mothered by curiosity and a need to inwardly explore the individual spiritual ramifications of one’s religion. Music which explores human experience is altogether much more convincing and sincere, and wonderfully accessible to listeners. This is true even when religion is taken out of the equation. It seems backwards, but the most humble and inspired musicians tend to look inwards for inspiration, whilst the most self absorbed and shallow never think to analyse themselves. The subject of this article (which I will now introduce, 415 words in), Pennsylvanian folk-pop group The Innocence Mission, fall perfectly into the introspective category. Forgive the epic preamble, but I feel that a spotlight on this act without a solid foundation of context is a waste.
Believe it or not, The Innocence Mission have been around for over 20 years… You certainly wouldn’t know it from hearing them. Their lovely brand of folky ballad has done a full loop, and now it seems that they have somehow become ahead of their time instead of behind it. Based around husband and wife combination Karen and Don Peris, The Innocence Mission write beautiful songs inspired principally by their deep Christian faith; another thing you wouldn’t know from hearing it. Lead vocalist, Karen Peris is a brilliant and motivated songwriter whose astounding voice could lullaby even the coarsest and bawdiest of folks into a sweet, calm slumber. With sounds comparable to Joanna Newsom and Regina Spektor, The Innocence Mission are on par with the biggest acts in the world; certainly in the female singer-songwriter genre. And what’s more, they’ve been doing it since before the two previously mentioned superstars had turned 10 years old.
In July 2010 The Innocence Mission released a new album, My Room in the Trees; their first release since 2007 (available here). The album has received glowing reviews; funnily enough a lot of them are from Christian publications. It’s obvious that their community have supported them for a long time, and helped them remain one of the best kept secrets in world music. I can’t imagine what more a Christian person would get out of The Innocence Mission than anybody else. Religious references are few and far between and when they do occur, they are often cleverly masked in metaphor; just universally enjoyable regardless of all things. It is well worth looking into The Innocence Mission’s collection of past works. Even their albums from the mid to early nineties are very current and relevant in today’s musical soundscape.
Country of Origin: USA
Sounds Like: Regina Spektor, Joanna Newsom
File Under: Folk pop
Myspace: myspace.com/theinnocencemissionPA
Official: theinnocencemission.com
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Christopher Lake said,
January 28, 2011 at 22:53
As a Catholic Christian who dearly loves The Innocence Mission, I want to thank you for such a wonderful, thoughtful piece on their music and “religious music” in its many varied forms. To paraphrase one of their fan’s accolades (which I once read), the IM strike me as creators of cinema for the ears. Truly wondrous music!
The one (and only one) detail in which I disagree with your piece is in your view that the IM’s songs offer no more to the person of religious faith than to any other person. Karen’s lyrics do, at times, speak of God, Christ, and faith– not in a preachy way but simply and humbly, in the loving way of one who calls God “Abba,” which means “Father,” or more accurately, “Daddy.” Moreover, especially in terms of a Catholic, sacramental mindset, all genuine beauty (including musical beauty) points to, and is an echo of, God, as He is seen, in Catholic theology, to be the ultimate Source and Ground of all true beauty. In that light, I find The Innocence Mission’s lyrics and music to be even more beautiful than I likely would have as an atheist (which I was for some time).
With that said (and again, it is only one small detail of a much larger piece of writing), this is a great, thoughtful essay on one of my favorite bands. I love good music criticism, and I will be sure to visit here again (and again) in the future! Thanks once more!
thomowenmiles said,
January 29, 2011 at 00:34
Thanks for the feedback, Christopher. It’s good to know that I’m not being offensive when I mean to be thoughtful, or coarse when I mean to be concise.
I did second-guess the section of the article you speak of, to be perfectly honest. I knew that the fact that I am not religious would most likely bias me in a way that would lead me to mask any religious references in ambiguity, in my own mind. Sometimes it’s easier to enjoy music when you can allocate your own meaning to it- especially when the probable intended meaning alludes to something that you can’t whole-heartedly stand behind. In saying that; I’d like to think that my own (and probably wrong) interpretation of the music is equally enjoyable as the intended one- which is probably an essay for another day.
Many thanks,
Thom