Voodoo Rhythm Reverend Beat-Man : Surreal Folk Blues Gospel Trash vol 3 -dvd- (CH,2008)****'
I just finished the preparations of my planned lecture on the origins of Roman-Christian religion dogmas and what it does to people. Then I found a cross at a fleamarket made by an uncle artist. Jesus on it looked exactly like me. I still decided to give it to my mother for mother’s day, also because it was her brother who painted this. For me it was a bit as if I gave my cross, I had to bear with them (and as how they imagined "their only way") back to her.
Besides, my conclusions for the lecture are that for this sort of Catholic religion there is no personal spiritual way, no road of discovering wisdom through life ; everything is only projected to the elite, where besides they thought to belong (my parent’s house was where the priests gathered and developed their ideas,* (-one of them we needed to call uncle after a while ; he remained the closest family member ever since, i heard him preach in church more often with directions towards me what I did wrong-) and this happened while the shadow of things of whatever they tend to do or think about things was maintained and confirmed within and behind this situation). Catholic religion seems to give more energy to the processes of the hidden dark parts, making it's religion looks for me more like a confirmation of a Satan’s way or benefit, while maintaining their own sins, and while condemning the rebels who could change things and increase possibilities, instead of restricting them, -those who could really see what was really happening. Even Jesus I'm sure was no Christian but looks more like a rebellious wisdom seeker, a reason for his crucifixion in the end, this is to a degree a celebrated important fact.
During my visit my father suddenly said he condemned the atheists because they’re selfish and only see themselves, and that everybody must have something to believe in, as if believing in itself is important, (religion for them grows that way they change their decisions during their lives for what they accept and what not. Because believing in itself is the most important fact it seems in reality, I have noticed that they don’t really believe in anything for real). He also said, as one of the only times he really said anything that showed any sort of vision at all, now as an 'opinion', that also incarnation he found a simplified way of thinking, to know that you can still come back and do it all over.
I became furious with his backwards judgements for his distinction between the superior God-believers and the others who in his vision can be nothing but immoral sinners. So, therefore I said that all great thinkers were atheists, (including Einstein who thought the God concept was hopelessly naïve) and that atheists are not selfish fools at all, but are more like realists (in a Plato fashion) who know that thinking is a projection and that people should take care of their own projections, besides religious people have shown me the heaviest sins, or idiot acts, and besides, I said, that Buddhists are also atheists.
Then they made up some lies on how much I had failed in life where they had done nothing else but be helpful. For this proclamation they exactly took out those few examples of my own attempts to make something of my studies, as if those were their initiatives, and the first where I could make a real choice of my own, and that I failed with it. I know it was through circumstances that I wasn’t able to finish those last two studies, but I had already left them, with violence and in secret, because they never would have let me go, something they also denied. And in contrast to my vision on 'extremism in religion' they said that they were always open, as if I was ever led by any choice at all. Now, because I disagreed with their opinions, they said it was proof that I hadn’t grown up myself yet. And for my immaturity in my visions I better find advice from someone who knows (a religious person). Their opposite approach of visions to me could only leave me sad or angry, knowing now even more how much their logic is not mine and never will be. In any manipulation they always were masters of adding confusion. Through time I can say how I understand their way of thinking, -it makes me sick, and that I know there exists no way they will ever get a grip on me, or not even how to themselves how they always have been keeping control of themselves and their environment. Let them leave me once more, alone.
The DVD of The Reverend Beat-Man after this is pure redemption and relief. It makes me smile now and then, while real dramas of realities are also sung about. Seductions and pain, it’s all part of life. The raw blues gospel sincerity in the expressions is truly compensating, and from the depths of the soul it is demanding a pure life’s energy, like punk but more consciously aware and directly consuming the trash. Of course this wouldn't have this form without its own comparable stories of personal confrontations with Christian religious order and sin. This odd mixtures of visions still comes to something honest and refers to a real person, with very direct expressions, and therefore : I love it. The songs can be simple, just slightly touching things that go much, much deeper into the soul essences of things ; it leaves them also unjudged, and pure, guided by an individuality that makes things strong in any of its raped circumstances, self-made seductions and failures or gotten into dramas, or just into the rawness of things. What I love very much is that each song has a different filmic concept, which makes it a real visual theatrical spectacle, from stage scenes, to poor man’s situations, funeral-prayers of gospel blues inspirations, expressions by puppets, or imitations of a gig played by children, with some devilish woman’s seductions appearing, references to 50s scenes, and to real life’s situations of being drunk or fucked up, with some strange and sick family settings as one of the backgrounds, expressed from black and white to colour, to fish-eye perspectives or with a few drawing comic expressions, sung in Swiss language, or German, -just once-, but mostly in English. I also pretty much like the thoughtful arrangements of banjo, electric guitars, drums and occasional other instruments, and the charismatic presence of the singer. Well prepared, and of course well recommended.
