Enjoyed a fantastic evening at the Waterfront Hall last night. In hindsight I think this was the probably the right time for Delirious? to call it a day.

They’ve always been a contradictory band. When I was a church teenager they seemed like an attractively dangerous alternative to the traditionalism of my upbringing and yet looking round the audience last night its clear how much their music has since been mainstreamed by the evangelical church.

Maybe they have been victims of their own success in a way. Their worship rock format was quite out there 15 years ago but now its the norm, and in terms of “marketplace” they now seem crowded out by younger, blander versions of themselves catering to the new worship genre – some of the examples from our own shores being particularly brainless.

Last year’s Kingdom of comfort album was also a good closer in the end. Their journey has been a contradictory one – CCM outsiders, flirting with radio and chart success before retreating into the American worship circuit and Joyce Meyer tours, then perhaps beginning to repeat themselves musically and lyrically. Yet Kingdom of Comfort is the closest they’ve come to matching 1999’s Mezzamorphis, and the sleevenotes show a refreshing honesty in how they’ve ended up playing inside a Christian bubble. The album’s social justice and anti-consumerism themes seemed to bring the band full circle in a way, and re-reading the sleevenotes this morning perhaps the writing was on the wall.

They leave behind a body of work that would be the envy of many other bands in terms of melody and production, and occasionally they hit some true lyrical heights along the way. Even amongst their weaker albums there have always been some gems and last night it showed in an emotional and perfectly paced two sets. They have always been a polished live band. Some of the songs that I grew to disregard brought back memories of more innocent, simpler times and the show built to quite a stirring finale which I got absorbed into, finding it hard to be cynical. It was a shame the hall wasn’t completely full and I wondered how many people there had been with Delirious? from the start as some the older classics got a more muted response than I had expected.

Delirious? were a truly unique and influential band that pushed the boundaries (probably not far enough) for Christian musicians, and love them or hate them if you’ve grown up around church and are about my age you will definitely have a few of their songs firmly implanted in your brain somewhere! In such a fractured Christian music scene I wonder if any one band will ever be as big again.

I find it hard to nail down favourite gigs, but at the same time I guess I’m becoming more underwhelmed by live music the older I get. There just aren’t many surprises these days. Arrive early to get a good spot, the support band might be listenable if you’re lucky, then after a few hours standing the main act comes on and by that stage I sometimes find myself thinking..I’d love a seat. Then there’s the tiresome encore routine. What? They’re going to come on again to play another song?? What…it’s their biggest hit? Well I wasn’t expecting that!

Maybe I’ve reached the point where I’ve been lucky enough to see a lot of my favourite bands in concert so gigs are now no longer the defining moments of youth? Anyway, I was thinking of those gigs which have been real disappointments. There haven’t been that many but here they are.

4. Flaming Lips – Belsonic Festival, Custom House Square (2008)
This isn’t a criticism of the band (who are ace on record and live) but of Belfast crowds, who can suck the life out of live music. I think Flaming Lips are better as a support act rather than the main draw, it fits with their underdog approach. And as the headliners here they worked so hard to get the crowd behind them but the standoff-ish audience just seemed to want to stare and chat.

3. Gomez – Mandela Hall (2002)
Loved their first two albums but by the time they were touring In Our Gun it seemed like they were pissed off with playing “the hits” and just jammed for two hours. Add the infamous Mandela Hall non-atmosphere and it was a pretty crap end of undergraduate life concert. Since then they’ve toured America and gained a bit of cult following over there!

2. Josh Rouse  - Spring & Airbrake (2005)
I have all of this guy’s albums and his first trip to Belfast was this show. He started off as an observant singer-songwriter before veering into 70s soft-rock pastiche. I preferred his earlier work but also enjoyed the more fun later stuff. But this gig majored on the later material and played it like a good-time party band. It was under an hour too, and the place was full of rowdy culchies for some reason. It affected how I viewed his music from then on.

1. U2 – Croke Park (2001)
Loved the 2001 Slane Castle show, but for some reason not long after they came on stage at Croke this summer I just wanted to go home. Mid-paced, poor sound, badly-arranged set and maybe just too big?

Far more good shows than bad ones really!

Speaking to a friend recently about live music in Belfast and that, even though there are more live bands playing here than ever, there are fewer that I actually want to go and see. The two best gigs I’ve been to this year (Bob Dylan and Wilco) were both in Dublin.

Going to the Empire tomorrow night though, to see Richmond Fontaine in support of their new album We used to Think the Freeway Sounded Like a River. I’ve followed them since 2004’s Post to Wire and last seen them in 2006 at a half -empty Spring and Airbrake (they also played in 2007 – I had a ticket but forget the show was on).

I still feel that I haven’t given Freeway enough of a listen, but then I think a lot of the best albums are like that. It takes a while for the music and lyrics to enfold. Willy Vlautin’s lyrics do focus on the seedier side of life, but always shot through with underlying hopefulness which surfaces eventually. If this album has a theme, perhaps its about adjusting to city life. The band’s previous albums have been set in small-town America, focussing on the break-ups and mess-ups of ordinary people. 2007’s Thirteen Cities pointed to life outside your hometown, and now Freeway seems to hint that compared to city bright lights, well, things aren’t so bad at home after all. There’s some kind of brokenness anywhere.

This video for “You can move back here” that I’ve only just found, sums up their music and the images they try to create perfectly:

In a previous job I ended up having to attend a range of party conferences, but I can confidently say this one is definitely the best. As a member I am of course, hugely biased!

Alaninbelfast has provided brilliant coverage of the day. I’m glad the party had the guts to open up the abortion debate. As was mentioned during the debate the PUP has always refused to shy away from difficult issues, especially those which are often not vote-winners.

It’s been a tradition over the past few years to invite an unexpected guest along to deliver the Billy McCaughey Memorial lecture, and this year it was Denis Bradley, from the Consultative Group on the Past. He had strong words for traditional unionists that saw themselves as blameless during the conflict, bad theology from the churches, and concern that a Tory government would bin the proposals for dealing with the past.

There’s opportunity for a good bit of banter at the conference too, and I’m proud to be associated with the party. I hope the visiting delegates and exhibitors were impressed.

Saw this film on Saturday night at the cinema and actually really liked it! I initially thought it might have been a bit too smug for its own good but was a funny and original take on the rom-com. Last film I reluctantly saw in this genre was The Proposal with Sandra Bullock the romantic comedy’s John Wayne a month or so ago, which you could have interchanged with any of her other films wthout knowing the difference! Apart from Zooey Deschanel this had a mostly unknown cast (to me anyway) and the plot took some enjoyable scenic routes to an unexpected but realistic ending.

The soundtrack was a nice surprise too, drawing on classic British pop like the Smiths and more recent groups like Doves. Proof that perhaps some Americans are still in thrall to much of our music as we are with theirs.

And so it was not to be in the end, outplayed and out-thought by a Slovakian side who wanted it more. I don’t believe there was much difference between the teams in terms of ability, but perhaps dare I say it the NI team was complacent last night.

Much has been written (possibly too much) about the fantastic Windsor atmosphere but maybe last night were the first signs of the team and supporters taking each other for granted. Many of our fantastic wins in recent years have started with the team coming from a goal down and when Slovakia scored how many of us thought ah sure they’ll come back. At the same time, maybe some of the players thought they could coast along with the crowd behind them – hang on we’re not literally the twelfth man!

Having come so close to qualification again its harder to find words of support for England (actually I never will support that lot), and of course the South who are still in with a chance. Hopefully later on I will rediscover that good will!

Still, perhaps more so than at any other match recently the roar of the home crowd behind the team at the beginning of the second half was truly stirring stuff.

Old man predicts the future – this is old but a good one. Has it really been four years since we beat England?

These dudes are far too smug. Why does church make me hate music I used to love?

I get weekly emails from Evangelical Alliance called “Friday Night Theology.” Sometimes I find them really interesting, other times less so but thats how it goes with these things. It was great this week as they posted the ten scariest Bible verses according to the ever-excellent Ship of Fools website.

Having been brought up on the gory imagery of nightmare hymns like “there is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel’s veins” I find some of these suitably grisly in a nostalgic way:

1. The ban on women teaching in church (1 Timothy 2:12)
2. Samuel’s instruction to ‘totally destroy’ the Amalekites (1 Samuel 15:3)
3. Moses’ command ‘Do not allow a sorceress to live.’ (Exodus 22:18)
4. The ending of Psalm 137 ‘Happy are those who seize your infants and dash them against the rocks’
5. The gang rape and murder of a concubine (Judges 19:25-28)
6. The condemnation of homosexuality (Romans 1:27)
7. Jephthah’s vow which led to his daughter being sacrificed (Judges 11)
8. God’s instruction to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac (Genesis 22:2)
9. The instruction that wives submit to their husbands (Ephesians 5:22)
10. The instruction that slaves submit to their masters (1 Peter 2:18)

Phew  - where to start??

It’s been a long time since my last post on this blog. Guess you just get out of the habit of making use of this particular form of therapy! Can’t believe that September is upon us once again. I still get that lump in the throat-type feeling at the end of August, haven’t shaken it off since school days – the feeling that, as Louis MacNeice puts it, “once again the gay months have eluded me.”

One day way back in July when it actually stayed dry, dad took some great photos of our dumb dog Che – this is one of them.

Hope to start visiting the blog a bit more often from now on.