Picture of spiritual health
So “God has worked” in Josh Cobb’s “heart”, as Aaron Swain puts it, and dissolved his bitterness toward southern gospel (as Swain implies) because Cobb may have shaved and cut his hair and had his picture taken in front of an old upright piano?
Hmmm. Methinks Swain might be hanging out too much with Daniel “by their effeminacy ye shall know them” Mount. Or maybe they’re both just children of a generation of fans who grew up being told by “the voice of Southern Gospel music” that facial hair was spiritually suspect and unsheared locks the mark of the beast on a man. I dunno.
In any case, Swain got so twitterpated about Cobb’s clean-cut photo in the myspace music player (here … and couldn’t the photo just be an old one dredged up for effect?) that he evidently didn’t actually listen to the song that’s playing when you log on to the page:
“Sons of the Singing Preacher” runs, in part, thusly:
“Who would have thought”
That seems to be the words
That fall off the tongues around my life.
And who would have thought
That just an honest search
Would cut all the strings that held my life.
And I know you never thought
That me and the sons of the singer preacher
Could ever reach you
But we did
So give up
And get in
And let’s get on with our lives
It’s a catchy little ditty … in a smart-aleck, muted-angsty Jayhawks kinda way (the title and lyrics might make a bit more sense with some background, here and here). And Cobb pretty clearly has grown up and found a much more natural current for his voice and talent to work in. At any rate, this certainly doesn’t sound like a song of reconciliation so much as the declaration of a guy whose resentment has turned to a kind of playful cynicism. So while he may have not come (back) to Jesus, he certainly does seem to be thriving musically, artistically. So, uhm, “let’s get on with our lives,” shall we?
And, Aaron, as for that clean-cut photo? One word, my friend: Irony.
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| Twitterpated… on 29 May 2010 at 1:28 pm
[…] According to Averyfineline, I mighta got carried away in my excitement. Yea, lookin’ back, I’d say I did. Ah well. I am, however, overjoyed to hear that he attended Roger Bennett’s funeral sporting the “clean” look that I saw on the Myspace.Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying a man’s hair is a reflection of his spiritual condition (William Lee Golden, anyone?). But “be ye seperate” comes to mind on the hair issue, but I’m gonna stay away from that can of worms… […]