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(press play so you can hear this while reading…)

Switchfoot is lucky, well, at least if they want to retain the title of “Jeremy’s Favorite All Time Band.” Had Brian McSweeney, Matt Sumpter, Chris Beaty and Wes Simpkins (later replaced by Russ Fox who went on to play for Bleach) decided to stick it out, there is no doubt in my mind Seven Day Jesus would hold the illustrious title.

Most SDJ fans are familiar with their self-titled Forefront released project, i.e. - the “one with Butterfly on it.” Unfortunately, you are missing out an outstanding rock album The Hunger, released about two year earlier on now defunct 5 Minute Walk. Most would say the styles of the only two studio releases were completely different –a fair assessment– but the common thread that makes both albums outstanding is Brian’s passionate vocals and (usually) poignant lyrics. -I throw the caveat in there for “Butterfly,” by far the most pop-induced song musically and lyrically. Yes, it’s catchy, but it comes off a bit “lets all hold hands and skip through open fields”-esque…

And while I do still enjoy the self-titled album, The Hunger blows it and nearly every other album I’ve ever owned away. I’d be hard pressed to pick an album above it, including any of the Switchfoot offerings. Let me put it this way… to my dismay, my wife lost the album a few years ago before I had converted all of my CDs to digital format. I haven’t let her live it down since… Finally, a friend of mine was nice enough to give me his copy (since I was too lazy or cheap to buy it on eBay) … i popped it in, not having heard it for several years and the lyrics to every last song rolled off my tongue like I was reciting the names of my family and friends. A couple of my favorites:

Apparent darkness but the sun still shines / I just can’t see it from my view / sometimes at midnight I forget it’s there at all / do You suppose I do the same with You? - Flybye

Now I’m thinking of His mind / and how His heart can love a man like me, and one like you / and could I even be so kind / forsaking everything I long to do … and now i’m standing at the cross / deciding where I’d like to hide / beneath the fortress of Your solitude / or in the gutters of my pride - Forgive You

I’ve gotta move on if I’m going to get to the rest of this post, but one last note on The Hunger: If you want to hear an extremely intense and biting song about forgiveness, check out “Forgive You (Rape My Soul)” … it’s so intense, it’s the only song I won’t let Tristen listen to. From what I remember, one of his friends was raped, and this song is about trying to find the strength to forgive as Christ forgives. Thus the lyrics above.

So what happened? The short of it, gathered from both speculation and directly from the lips and hands of the front man, Brian was not nearly as interested in marketing Jesus as the Christian music industry was in the late 90s. The long of it goes much deeper than that, but the bottom line is they split due to fundamental differences in opinions concerning the bands “responsibility” to write and market themselves a certain way. I don’t know all the intricacies of the falling out, but I do know when I snuck backstage during their ForeFront tour (it was a small venue), A) Brian was excited that I had actually heard the first album, B) didn’t want to talk too much about the second, and C) said something along the lines of “I’ve got to write from the heart, and I don’t know if I can do that where we’re at right now” (paraphrased, it was a 10 years ago).

Thankfully Brian and Matt joined forces and resurfaced in the Chicago based alt-rock band, Matthew. Once again the style shifted to less pop and more melodic alt-rock, but the tandem and two new members proved they can put out any style with great quality. The lyrics are much more enigmatic and cover a wide range of everyday life topics. Knowing Brian’s background I may read more into certain sections than I should, but there is a tinge of undertones that point to his spirituality and his pain. I’m not presumptuous enough to claim he is writing about issues specific to his early experiences in the Christian music scene, but in some cases I wouldn’t be surprised. When their site and message board was live, Brian was willing to speak to his fans on a regular basis, but rarely addressed questions concerning the lyrics, so I guess i’ll never know.

It’s been six years since I bought Matthew’s Everybody Down album… they teased with a few new songs on myspace about two years ago, but I haven’t heard much since. Unfortunately right now I cannot get to any “social networking” site such as MySpace… something about company internet policies… pssshh… I’ve been meaning to check it out in prep for this post, but alas I’ve barely had any personal time on the comp at home lately. I am hopefult that when I check it out tonight I can find some good news. In the meantime, enjoy Strength off of The Hunger while you heading to ebay to buy SDJ stuff and Myspace to enjoy Matthew.

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