Eclipse

Christopher Hoffman put out a gospel album entitled 'The Road'. On it, he explores his faith and his relationship with Jesus Christ. There's just one problem, at least as where Evangelicals are concerned: He's gay as a picnic basket.

I love the idea of anybody who feels no need to thump their chest and proclaim how their brand of faith is The One True Message in order to make them feel superior in the here and now. Christopher simply details the road he's traveled, spiritually, and isn't out to convert anyone. But were his sexuality not enough to piss off the people who think they hold a copyright on the words of Jesus Christ, he also strongly identifies with the Wiccan faith. Myself, I'll quote from The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra: "I'm a scientist. I don't believe in anything." But Chris is a Christian Wiccan, or a Wiccan Christian, depending. I recently told him, "Hey, if you're going to be a person of faith, why settle for just one?"

After a years-long struggle, he and his partner, Jake, have finally adopted two kids (again, a major difference of opinion in that I think NOT breeding is the major perk of homosexuality) and are, finally a real family. He's ready to record again.

And he's asked me to produce. My first return to audio in years and I'm working on a fucking gospel album. Okay, granted, a queer, witchy gospel album from a guy with sleeve tats featuring tarot cards and Harry Potter characters, but still. What's next? I get a call from Alan Jackson?

If you click on Christopher's name at the beginning of this post you can hear samples from his last album. This is not at all the sort of thing I generally listen to, but because of our shared love of penises and Italian horror movies we ended up friends.

There's one song on the album, Eclipse, that has nothing to do with faith but rather his struggle with bi-polar disorder. It's sheer hell to suddenly find yourself miserable for no real reason. You know it's biochemical, but that does nothing to relieve the sheer physical and mental torture you're going through. Chris wrote a song comparing this to planetary motion and I thought the analogy was brilliant. Again, click on his name to hear a sample from it. Even though I'm not a fan of the arrangements on the album, there's no disputing the boy has pipes and can belt them out. Just for fun and just for him, I did a remix of this song:

Christopher Hoffman--Eclipse (Spookshow In Your Pants Prozac Remix)

So now he wants to do something true to his beliefs but sounding freaky and weird. The ancient Chinese had a curse: May you live in interesting times.