Sunday 5 June 2011

Pentecost "hymns"

Having sadly missed the boat with my choice of "hymns" for ascension day, I thought I'd best get in early for Pentecost. I'm sure that all those leading services next Sunday will be eternally grateful...


“Wind of change” (Scorpions)
“Fire in the Sky” (Yngwie Malmsteen)
Or, better perhaps - “There’s a Fire in the House” (Steve Vai)
"Firestarter" (Prodigy)
“Brand New Start” (Alter Bridge)

Technically the Vai one isn't a hymn as there are no lyrics... So perhaps my Anglican friends might call it a postlude or recessional or something of that ilk (at least that's what Wiki thinks and Wiki must be right...?!).

3 comments:

  1. What makes something a 'hymn' anyway? The Verve released an album called 'Urban Hymns' in 1997 and I'm pretty sure none of those tracks have been used in a church service yet, so something's clearly not right...
    How about 'Shake shake Mama' by Bob Dylan or 'Falling' by McAlmont and Butler for your Pentecost service? Or is that perhaps a little too denominational?!
    By the way, check out Vai's contributions to the latest Meat Loaf album if you haven't done so yet - very impressive and you have got to love a title like 'Hang Cool Teddy Bear', so you can't go wrong really!

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  2. How about "Who by fire?" by Leonard Cohen.

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  3. I think "Hippy hippy shake" or "Shakin all over" might be interesting but not exegetically accurate on closer examination of Acts 2...

    Indeed, though, what is a "hymn"? Perhaps it is from the Greek in Colossians 3:16 (humnos) - no I'm not kidding. But then what differentiates a "humnos" from the "psalm" and the "ode" (song) - all 3 terms found there... Maybe there was a known structure or something, dunno.

    On a different note, I was struck in a reading of the Greek Septuagint the other day when I came across the word "bakteria" (I think that was the Greek spelling) meaning "stick". Hmmm, these scientists are so clever. "Look Albert there's some funny-looking stick shaped thingys under the microscope... what shall we call them?" "Dunno, but stick might sound a bit dull... what's stick in Greek?"

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