I love the music of Watchhouse, (fka Mandolin Orange). Watchhouse is Andrew Marlin and Emily Frantz (sometimes with a band). Their newest, Album, Austin City Limits Live, is a great example of their music.
I don’t always understand the meaning of all their songs and their lyrics, but I resonate with their music. I am not a lover of the postmodern theory of interpretation. I think that we should strive to understand the artist’s original meaning, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get our own meaning out of the songs written by other people
Artists like Bob Dylan seem to enjoy being purposely obtuse. Many musicians have written hit songs with gibberish for lyrics. Then, there is the Beatles tune, I Am the Walrus, that pushes this art to a more eloquent, absurdist extreme.
But songs that connect best with us, I believe, are the songs that have real meaning, and especially real meaning to us. We can even find that in a Bob Dylan song.
I am probably not being completely fair to him by saying he was purposely obtuse. I think he was going for meaning in most of his songs. It’s just that the meaning, perhaps, is not as easily articulable apart from the lyrics and the song.
Art often isn’t rational, in the sense of logical syllogisms. Few of us would likely call logic art. Artists often credit a muse inspired meaning that is not immediately clear, even to the artist. Artists sometimes channel inarticulable meaning into music and song.
I can understand the intuitive creativity of an artist, though I am not an artist. Artists have the ability to connect with people around the edges of the penumbra of their own understanding where the ability to articulate meaning becomes ineffable. Some artists have the gift of being able to communicate elegantly, clearly, and poignantly in their music.
Watchhouse is one of those artists. The song, That Wrecking Ball, hits home particularly with me today as I listened to it for perhaps the 100th time. (Not today. I have only listened to it a few times today.)
Navigating by Faith 