Looking back at the road so far, the journey’s left its share of scars…
This line rather aptly opens the Self-Titled record. I have to admit, it is one record I’d all but forgotten about until Geof asked me to write something for its 15th anniversary. Over the years and my journeys around the world – both literally and figuratively – my CDs slowly became replaced by a collection of digital files. The CD jackets I’d once treasured so dearly – worn out and faded from pouring over them for every last lyrical detail – now only a myth I’m reminded of by tiny thumbnails in my iTunes library.
Caedmon’s Call was not my introduction to the band. In fact, by the time the record came out in 1997, it was a long-anticipated event among a group of eager and devoted fans spread across the plains of Texas.
But I do remember the first time I ever heard a Caedmon’s Call song. I was in my freshman year of high school, a wee lass of 15, sitting in the front row of a nearly-empty cavernous Lubbock, Texas church sanctuary with 300 classmates. The chapel band, including my at-the-time-devastatingly-amazing high school crush, had tucked into an earnest-but-green version of ‘April Showers’. I was hooked.
Megan at the 40 Acres Release Show
I followed said group down to a little coffee shop on 19th Street a couple of months later where college kids – much older than I at the time – sipped on huge Friends-sized coffee cups and played cards. When the band took the stage in their deliciously unpretentious uniform of grotty t-shirts and worn out and holey jeans, I was hooked for good.
I never liked the song ‘Lead of Love’ particularly, but these lines so aptly capture the past 17 years. There was a time when I didn’t hesitate for a second to cross state lines in order to catch Caedmon’s Call once, or thrice, on their latest tour. I recruited friends and even family members to camp out on a freezing, dewy East Texas field for the first-ever Guild concert. I waited patiently after concerts just to get five minutes chatting to the band.
Over time, the members of Caedmon’s Call graciously accepted me – one of their most devoted and stalkerish fans – as a friend.
Megan Eaves and Garett Buell
Over time, too, the band came to represent, more than its music, a group of like-minded people. To meet a fellow Caedmon’s Call fan in those heady early days was a rare treasure. An instantaneous friend. A companion who understood just how good the band was. Like any true grassroots following, it was a cult effort.
Just like so many of their fans, my love of Caedmon’s Call stemmed out of their approachable lyrics. They called me to question the world of pop-Christianity I was surrounded by at the time and begged me to remember that music, above all, should be provocative and a cause for questioning, rather than a result of a record label’s “Jesus count”.
All these years later, Caedmon’s Call is still regularly on my playlist. The rich layers of the band’s sound – from the trio of Cliff’s, Danielle’s and Derek’s such different vocals to the unique percussion of Garett Buell and the driving drums of Todd Bragg – can still hold its own against the rest of my music collection. No small feat. They are a band I never hesitate to introduce new friends to, and several of my closest friends and family are now ardent fans themselves.
I wouldn’t call Self-Titled Caedmon’s Call’s best moment, nor its worst. For me, many of the songs are better rendered on other records (especially the epic Just Don’t Want Coffee EP, a record by which I still judge any new speaker system). But what it represented was a watershed moment when Caedmon’s Call went from a small Texas college group to a band following their own journey and leading us along with them.
For me, the various records in Caedmon’s discography were at one time each connected saliently to memories of high school, college, road trips, first loves and first heartaches. And while those memories still linger in the melodies and lyrics, the songs have followed me ‘round the world (a couple of times) and carry ever-new meanings all the time.
I’m coming home, I’m coming home.
But I’m still a long way off.
reading this makes me write a similar story in my head. perhaps i’m going to have to pen one myself. so many memories, friends, moments in time…all because of one band. even a husband. i love that photo of you and garrett…one of my favorite photos, and moments, at the guild weekend. if i could go back in time, i would revisit all my caedmon’s call moments. listening to their songs today still floods to many wonderful memories into my heart.
I still remember where I was when I got this CD. I purchased from BGM music as part of their 15 free CD scams (remember those?, Get 10 free and promise to by 5 by such-and-such a date?) Anyway, I heard “Hope to Carry On” on WOW 1998 CD. I really liked that song, so I checked, but sadly, they didn’t write the song. “At least they knew who to cover (Rich Mullins)” I thought to myself, so I picked the Self-Titled album to be delivered. I knew nothing of the band except they did a cover of Rich Mullin’s song. I got the CD, went into my room, put it in the CD player, opened the liner notes, and hit ‘Play’. They had me, “hook, line, and singer singin’” (to quote another wonderful influence, Andrew Peterson) after that first guitar intro. Just learning guitar myself at this time, I credit Caedmon’s Call for my love of the guitar. It was this album that made me understand Bryan Adams… “I played until my fingers bled.”
I listened to that album 3 or 4 times all the way through nonstop. I remember getting out an encyclopedia to look up “Mt. Athos” and a dictionary for ‘vestige’ They turned my on to a love of reading everything from Greek mythology to the bible itself in a new way. They turned me on to The Story, Indigo Girls, and countless other singer songwriters that I never would have known. They made me appreciate Dylan better. all with this self-titled CD.
This CD will always hold a special place in my heart. Rarely a week goes by that this song does NOT get played even 15 yrs later…
Can’t believe I’m just now seeing this. It’s been too long since I’ve visited cc.net! I, too, wrote a blog post about the first time I heard a Caedmon’s Call song, wrote it way back in January, had not thought about the 15 year anniversary of the album:
http://teamredd.blogspot.com/2012_01_01_archive.html
I haven’t written any more of the series I was starting…(I’ve got three kids now…) but I’ve got some more posts in the works now. This band was such a big influence on my coming-of-age years as well.