Currently Listening to:
Amos Lee: Last Days at the Lodge
J. Ray: Dreams and Visions

I have a new email account. It’s cj.casciotta@me.com.
I have an iPhone, iMac, listen to my music on iTunes, etc.
With cheaper costs and innovative technology, the folks over at Apple have brought us all into the “I generation.” Never before have we been able to entertain ourselves with such ease and convenience. Never before have we been able to organize our lives, goals, and preferences with such efficiency.

Apple has touched a nerve with culture today…the desire to create one’s own unique brand. Apple has created a brand that allows others to brand themselves. Whether it’s posting playlists, mobile uploads, or status updates, one now has the profound ability to share with the world just who “me” is.

I could easily geek out here and talk about the incredible ramifications this means for musicians, filmmakers, and artists (did you know there’s an application on iPhone that lets you record original music and share it with others instantly?)…..but I’ll save that for the Undiscovered page.

So what does this mean for us, as a culture, as individuals, as believers? Has Apple and other revolutionaries created a generation of self-centered, ego-centric individuals?
I would argue the answer to that question is entirely up to us. While Apple technology may have expanded opportunities to elevate “me,” it has also created new ways to interact with others, completely reconstructing the once fragmented walls of community. Never before have we had the ability to interact with others, reconnect with long lost friends, and build new relationships with the speed and ease we do now.

Some believers have already caught on to the possibilities. As bizarre as it sounds, LifeChurch.tv is a virtual church that meets on SecondLife.com. No building, no walls, but rather real people logging into a virtual world (SecondLife), They come to hear God’s Word preached, sing songs, and even tithe….real money! That’s right, people actually contribute financially to this church, a church that recently acquired the finances to build and support an iPhone app version of the Holy Bible, complete with commentary and search engine. Whether you agree with the notion that this can actually be called a church or not, consider the many troops over in Iraq that log into LifeChurch every Sunday to worship with a community of believers while stationed in a country where going to church isn’t an option.

When I think about the emerging “mobile me” culture, I am both excited and cautious.  I’m currently  touring around California with my worship project, Parachute Passing, playing at camps, churches, and youth events, and what we encounter most in the hearts of  junior high and high school students is this epic battle against a culture that has stolen their identity. Whether it’s a magazine rack that distorts real beauty or advertisements and real life pressures that convince them to buy, look, or compromise their way to acceptance, their identity is constantly at war (I use the word “they” but if I’m honest, I often struggle with the same things). I think that’s why Apple, SecondLife, and other new mediums are so appealing to our generation. They allows us to shape our identity digitally so we can build our way to acceptance and community.

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In decades to come, Jon Foreman may go down as one of the most poignant and unique songwriters of our generation. With the completion of his fourth and final installment in his Season EPs, Summer, Foreman delivers profound honesty, originality, and a bold rebellion of the conventional.

The best thing about listening each EP (Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer) is that they have the ability to transport the listener to each season both lyrically and musically, each having its own distinct sound and thematic elements. Producer Charlie Peacock, string arranger Keith Tutt, and Jon have created songs that hint of simpler times when rock & roll, Motown, and folk were just beginning. In addition, the artists inject a classical element to each of the songs, using strings and brass is unconventional but pleasant ways though at times slightly overly reminiscent of Sufjan and the Arcade Fire.

Throughout each EP, Foreman possesses the courage to speak honestly as a man and follower of God in a way not seen since the days of Dylan or Cash. Foreman’s EP’s are scattered with love stories that surprisingly stray away from the normal clichés as well as lyrics taken directly from some of scripture’s most overlooked revelations. Foreman is one of the few pioneers out there who can put the written word of the Bible to a song without making it sound like “Christian music.”

In addition, Foreman boldly breaks away from the safe confines of the Christian  industry with these independently produced projects. In both  is love songs and theology Foreman distributes such provocative and controversial lyrics as “the sea and the shore fall and rise like her breast as she breathes by my side”

and  

“your eyes are closed when you’re praying
you sing right along with the band
you shine up your shoes for services
but there’s blood on your hands”

To wrap up, the season EP’s by Jon Foreman are a reckless abandonment from the Christian subculture as well as pure and insightful reflections from a seasoned and unconventional songwriter. At least four out of six songs on every EP are timeless classics with truths that will carry past generational gaps. Worth the buy.

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So I realize this is the second Disneyland related post in 2 weeks but hear me out, I think after this I’ll have it all out of my system.

It wasn’t too long ago that I was at Disneyland, watching Fantasmic: probably one of the greatest live performances in the history of the world.

After the show, the park began to close and the large pile of tourists began filing out to their cars. The kids at Disneyland are really what it’s all about. Some kids were asleep, other kids were crying, and other kids were running full speed ahead into my legs (I don’t know why this happens, but they always seem to do this to me when I go to Disneyland. I am a huge advocate for giving children under the age of 12 seeing-eye-dogs whenever they enter a major theme park.)

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Well, gas has officially gone over $4 in California making it virtually impossible for our generation to be the one that changes how Americans consume.

Let me explain: I truly believe that for a while, both the mosaic and buster generations were headed towards a mindset that it is better to pay the extra dollar to support the creative, the weird, the pure, and the honest. However, with the economy currently in shambles without much sign of hope, college students and young adults are crunching numbers and pinching pennies more than ever before simply to survive.

This means that the corporate giants remain on top of the world. Rather than going to the corner coffee shop where the local indy-genius is offering his craft and selling his carefully self-produced album, people are passing through the Starbucks drive-thru and downloading digital singles at a rapidly increasing pace. People are spending far less time creating and connecting with culture and are rather embracing a mentality of self-preservation and individualism.

Ok. And there’s your uplifting thought of the day. Thanks for reading!

Just kidding. I’m not trying to sound depressing here friends. In no way do I want to sound like another complaining mosaic, but as a writer and thinker I feel a responsibility to challenge our generation with what’s at stake. As we grow up and become the decision makers, money spenders, and influencers we MUST understand the importance of community. We MUST be intentional about the causes we care about, raising our voice far less than we raise our bodies, minds, and wallets to our creator who has promised to sustain us. It seems to me that the pursuit for all things good (whether it’s a cup of coffee or a characteristic of God) is a choice.

Beauty is a choice.

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The year is 1996. The setting, Orlando Florida.

It was like any other trip to Disneyworld we had taken in the past. Only today…we were going somewhere different.

My well meaning parents were about to take my brother and I on an experience unlike anything we had ever encountered…an experience, they said, was sure to prove both fun and educational (1st sign of warning). As we waved goodbye to the Magic Kingdom, we started driving toward Orlando’s best-kept secret…. The Holy Land Experience.

Yes, the Holy Land Experience, where according to their site, you can “look into the eyes of the one who changed the course of history.”

I was not ready to meet Jesus. I was still a little freaked out by Mickey Mouse and the fact that he never spoke off camera.

The Holy Land, masked as a thrill-providing amusement park was worse for the imagination and attention span of a kid than a field trip to the local cheese factory. What was more amazingly disappointing was that while we could have been losing our lunch on Space Mountain, we were stuck at Jesus' home away from home where there were a wopping…count em…. ZERO rides.

There was a show though. I remember vividly seeing a musical re-inaction of the resurrection with Jesus wearing one of those Britney Spears microphones around his ear.

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It’s nearing mother’s day again. Thank you network television for reminding me during Wheel of Fortune (yes, in my apartment four college age men gather at 7:30 in a nightly ritual thought only to be practiced by senior citizens). After I snapped out of the “Oh crap, I missed it” panic, I quickly headed to the nearest CVS (open 24 hours) to find a card I could send to my mother 3,000 miles away.

Upon entering the pearly automatic gates of CVS, I made my way to the Mother’s Day section of the greeting card isle. This turned out to be a huge disappointment. Tell me greeting card people, not all of you, just the ones in charge of mother’s day: Do you think the majority of the male population just might want to send their mother a card a color other than pink???

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Hey conversaholics,

So I decided once a month I'm just gonna post a bunch of stuff that I found on the web that I find amusing and relevant to our conversations in the hopes that you will help them go "viral". Here's the first installment:

1.) Remember we talked about Justin? Here's an amazing indie songwriter, Eric Hutchinson, doing a pretty funny routine regarding the quality of JT's music. Eric just came out with a new album called "Sounds Like This." Check it out on iTunes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZzB0m-rmKM

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So Justin brought sexy back. Apparently it was missing. Either way, I thought this was a discussion worth having as Christians:

As a songwriter, it amazes me the amount of discussions I seem to get thrust into concerning what is appropriate and what is not when it comes to the music our generation chooses to listen to.

“Is that song a Christian song?”
“Well are the guys in the band Christians?”
“Is this song about God or the lead singer’s girlfriend?”

Let’s back up a little and look at the concept of creation. God, the inventor of the universe and everything in it did this crazy little thing by creating a means for humans to express our love and devotion to him called music.

God’s gift of music existed long before the record industry’s attempt to make the word “Christian” a genre in the late 70’s.

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