Grace into disorder: 'The Turning,' Leslie Phillips

O HAY THAR INTARWEBZ.

Today's review is on The Turning by Leslie Phillips (1987), which, apparently, is One Of The Greatest Contemporary Christian Music ("CCM") Albums Of All Time. Oh crap.

LOL SHITTY LO-RES COVER ART

Now, I'm about as Christian as the Pope is Catholic. But despite my transgressions against God and Man due to my heathen-y, godless communist ways, I have historically listened to a little bit of the bland crappy crap crap known as CCM. Upon listening to said bland crappy crap crap on and (mostly) off for the last five years, I have concluded, through mathematical logic, that The Turning is not, in fact, CCM. BEHOLD MY REASONING SKILLZ.

CCM is bland crappy crap crap.
The Turning is not bland crappy crap crap.
Therefore, The Turning is not CCM.

Don't you wish your maths skills were this awesome? I learned how to do that in calculus!

Anyway, Phillips had been doing pretty cheesy Christian pop music until this point. But then something happened. I don't really know what, as I can't claim to know her life story, but she started writing darker songs and apparently wasn't entirely comfortable with her record label and its proclamation that she was the "Christian Cyndi Lauper". She also apparently had more than few struggles with her faith. So she hooked up with producer T-Bone Burnett (and he produced the record, too! HAHA! HAHA!) and recorded The Turning. After that, she got dropped from her old label and began recording secular pop/rock music with the likes of Brian Wilson's BFF Van Dyke Parks under the name Sam Phillips. The first "Sam" album, The Indescribable Wow, is really amazing, and I promise a review of it in the future.

But first, The Turning.

The album starts off with the soft and acoustic-y "River of Love." I am under the impression, too, that said River of Love is not River Phoenix, or the Ganges, or the Nile. I'm pretty sure it's actually Jesus, since apparently there's a river of love that runs through all time, and Jesus is famous for that whole eternity thing. But you never know with those CCM records - they can be tricky and soooooo opaque sometimes. This is a really nice song though, and it sets the tone for the rest of the album, as it's slightly dark but full of emotion. Understated, with floral notes and a distinct woody undertone, layered with --- wait, wrong review.

"Love is Not Lost" sounds a little bit more like it has a secular influence, both in terms of musical and lyrical content. Sister Sles (God, I am so fucking clever) attempts to do some kind of screechy punk-pop thing, pre-dating Avril Lavigne by 15 years and somehow still not sucking! Anyway, it's one of those boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl, you-know-the-rest songs (those are actually in the lyrics, I'm not shitting you) but Sameslie reminds the listener that we shouldn't give up on love, because, hey, love is not lost. Go figure.

The title track is really dark compared to the last two tracks (and they weren't really a walk in the park), and relies a lot on harmonies and rounds of Sleslie's vocals. It's really produced and arranged well, and the music is well-composed. The verses are very percussion heavy, and then the jangly guitars get all strummy-like in the mantra-ish chorus: "And when it turns on me/Don't let it turn me." My guess, again, is that "it" is her faith in God, since the song thematically deals with struggling with changes in a relationship to or with something.

The next song, "Libera Me," is a Burnett composition, and one of the best on the album. It starts out with minimal instrumentation (electric guitar and handclaps back the first verse), then progressively adds more sonic variations (bass, then drums, then backing vocals) until it becomes a full-fledged pop-rock romp. The lyrics are quite good, and the title of this review is derived from one of the better lines in the song: "I know there is a place/Free from no borders/ Before I turn this grace/Into disorder." The title, which kind of upset and confused me at first, is actually derived from a part of Latin Mass and translates to "Deliver Me," which is quite appropriate given the subject matter.

"Carry You" reprises the darker musical arrangements and vocal harmonies from "The Turning" but is generally more simplistic in its approach. The electric guitar throughout the song makes me feel like I'm listening to a spaghetti Western in slow-mo. The lyrics seem a bit half-arsed in terms of effort, but they actually work well in terms of affecting the listener: "When the water's too high/I will carry you" are the only lyrics in the whole goddamned song, with the exception of two repetitions of "When the night is too black," but Sleslie will still carry us here. Thank God, I was getting scared. This song, for me anyway, sort of has a double meaning: I feel like (given the context of the album so far) it's probably something God would say to His believers when they are struggling with their respective faiths. However, I think it makes a nice (albeit incredibly simple) proclamation of unconditional love for another person, too.

"Beating Heart" is another upbeat number, and the most straightforwardly rock song on this album. The verse features Sleslie questioning her life and how long it will last: "How long have I got/Before passion gives up its fire/How long have I got/Before time strangles desire/Oh, my fear is to leave here/Never having really arrived." She establishes a clear belief in God here, it seems, but also is uncertain of said God's plans for her. HEAV-Y, man.

"Expectations" has an excellent arrangement musically - it's very different compared to the other songs on the album, as the rhythmic percussion (sounds like a marimba or a xylophone or bells or something? Jesus Christ, I don't know. It goes fucking "dinky dinky dink dink") provides the framework for the song musically, while the drums are being played at a different pace. The vocals are even screechier than "Love Is Not Lost," which sucks, because it makes an otherwise cool song a bit less tolerable than it ought to be.

My favorite song on The Turning is probably "Down." Oddly enough, this is the only song that betrays this album's age, due to the synthesized hand claps and drum programming. This is the most doubteriffic (I made that word up, amazingly enough) song on the album, and also the most dark. Even darker than "The Turning," which at least has a hypnotic and catchy chorus to balance things. The lyrics show her doubting (and even rejecting) her faith while God tries to keep her from straying through... Christ, fucking pleading: "Down/Comes my religion like leaves/On winter trees/Down/You come to me/With Your love on hands and knees." Wow. Wow. I don't know how a Christian label actually accepted this totally... non-praisey song. The vocals further reveal her anger and dissatisfaction with her religion (Sleslie has famously rejected born-again theology). Greeeeaaaaat song.

"Answers Don't Come Easy" departs from the almost tortured "Down" completely. The lyrics are full of faith ("I can wait/It's enough to feel so near you now/And when answers don't come easy/I can wait"). The song, musically speaking, is mellow pop and even comforting. Phillips is actually singing. This is almost a lullaby. Except with drums. The guitars are rich and shimmery. Everything is perfect about this song. It would be the perfect end to the album, if not for the REAL last track...

"God Is Watching You." OH HOLY CHRIST WHAT THE HELL IS THIS CRAP. I almost didn't buy the album upon seeing this title and reading the lyrics. Really. It was that scary and intimidating. I think Sleslie was probably pressured by record execs to put at least one obnoxious God-fearin' track on this album, so T-Cake wrote her a song so she didn't wind up in the corner in a fetal position. It's a nice song and flows well (acoustic guitar arrangement = yay) if I ignore the fact that the lyrics are heavy-handed religious crap. Thankfully, since Burnett wrote the words to this song, I take a little comfort in it and I can pretend it's not really a Sleslie Phillips song. Plus, since it's the last song, if it ever becomes too offensive, it can be easily ignored. That said, it's a fucking earworm and I actually found myself singing it in my kitchen yesterday. Goddamnit.

Anyway, Leslie (now secular Sam! Don't you love clever alliteration?) really did a nice job with this album. Admittedly, Burnett's presence helped a lot: I can't imagine the songs being produced or arranged in a different way and working out. In addition, his production (with a few minor exceptions, as mentioned previously) and her instrumentation are done well enough not to betray the year this album was made. She's a great songwriter, and isn't too heavy-handed (*cough* T-Bone) when it comes to her God lyrics. Basically, this is a great album that I absolutely refuse to lump in with the rather uninteresting genre of CCM... but really... it is super Christian-y in terms of theme and lyrics, so... I... I AM SO TORN. Anyway, totally and completely recommended. Buy it now. Or download it off iTunes. Seriously.

The Turning, Leslie (Sam)* Phillips - 9/10





*This was re-released in 1997 under the Sam moniker, but the original 1987 (vinyl and cassette only, I think) release says "Leslie."