In 1980, I was invited to a James Taylor concert, but our church softball team was in the playoffs. If our right fielder got injured, I might get to play. I decided to put the team first and have regretted it ever since. I still haven’t been to a James Taylor concert.
In a meager attempt to address this mistake, Carol and I attended “The Carole King and James Taylor Story.” The crowd looked like my high school reunion — bald guys, bifocals and sensible shoes. There was a 65th birthday party a few tables in front of us. The show should have started at 5:00. When we heard the first few notes of “So Far Away,” we turned up our hearing aids.
Carol and Brett Younger
At first, I thought Dan Clews sounded like James Taylor with a head cold, but as the night progressed, I realized James Taylor sounds like he has a head cold. Phoebe Katis has a fine voice that sounds nothing like Carole King’s, but, unfortunately, the woman behind me thought she sounds exactly like Carole King.
Dan and Phoebe told stories about James and Carole, who have seven marriages between them and none to each other. When King played keyboard in Taylor’s band, he was the one who encouraged her to sing her own songs.
When Toni Stern had a failed romance with James Taylor, Stern wanted to write a song that suggested she was the one who did the breaking up. She enlisted King, Taylor’s dear friend, to help her write, “It’s Too Late.”
The “holy host of others” in “Carolina in My Mind” refers to the Beatles sitting on the front row of a James Taylor concert.
The Beatles’ Abbey Road label produced Taylor’s first album. The “holy host of others” in “Carolina in My Mind” refers to the Beatles sitting on the front row of a James Taylor concert.
James was dealing with depression when he wrote, “Look down upon me Jesus. You gotta help me make a stand” in “Fire and Rain.” Taylor’s songs were so sad he was known as “the tear ducts of America.”
Dan and Phoebe were selling nostalgia, but that did not feel like what we were buying. Something new happened. We loved the music like it was the first time.
Except for two songs. When we got to the encore, Phoebe and Dan decided to sing two of their songs. The songs were OK, and we understand why they wanted to sing something they had written, but it was cheating. We were there for Carole and James. Phoebe and Dan’s songs weren’t “You’ve Got a Friend.”
I thought about this when I read this quote from John Fugelsang: “Look, if you’re in a band and you call yourself a Rolling Stones cover band, but you don’t do any songs by the Rolling Stones, you just do Vanilla Ice and Nickelback, then find a new name for your group. (If you think Christianity tells you who to hate) you’re not a Christian. You can call yourself what you want. There are Christians, and there are Christ followers. That’s the whole history of the religion. There’s authoritarian Christianity, and they’re always opposed by the people who actually follow Jesus.”
The history of Christianity is a battle between those who are playing Jesus’ songs and those who are making up their own. People who call themselves Christians say things in Jesus’ name that are the opposite of what Jesus says in the Bible. Unchristian Christians have claimed Jesus was in favor of imperialism, wars, racism, homophobia and the rich.
Christians cannot play Jesus’ music while denying health care, arresting immigrants seeking asylum or curtailing voting rights.
Christians cannot play Jesus’ music while denying health care, arresting immigrants seeking asylum or curtailing voting rights. Christians cannot play Jesus’ music while attacking people for their sexuality, home country or skin color. Christians cannot play Jesus’ music while supporting the destruction of the environment, easy access to gambling or unfettered free-market capitalism.
Christians are supposed to be Jesus’ cover bands, but the Jesus-free version of Christianity has a lot of fans. For the people who use Jesus’ name to sell bad songs, Jesus’ actual words must be triggering.
Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” (Matthew 5:9). Real Christians are cover bands singing about peace.
Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me” (Matthew 25:45). Christians sing about caring for the poor, hurting, hungry, homeless and lonely.
Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39). Christians sing the songs of our Iranian neighbor, our Venezuelan neighbor, our transgender neighbor, our uninsured neighbor and our undocumented neighbor.
The music of God’s love is far more beautiful than the music of anger. Carole suggests:
Show the world all the love in your heart
Then people gonna treat you better
You’re gonna find, yes you will
That you’re beautiful, as you feel
Jesus’ cover bands understand why James sings:
There ain’t no doubt in no one’s mind
That love’s the finest thing around.
We should sing about that.
Brett Younger serves as senior minister at Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, N.Y.