TRYING to Get it Right with the Ruralists (ep. 40)

On this episode of the podcast, I talk with two members of the band The Ruralists, Luke Hawley and Laremy Devries, about their new album, Trying. You may recognize the name and their music from the intro and the outro of this podcast. This was the 40^th episode of the podcast, and we recorded it live on the stage of the B.J. Haan auditorium at Dordt University, with a small studio audience. They play three songs off the new album (lyrics below) and we discuss, along the following topics:

• The story of the band, the name of the band, and the name of the album
• What "ruralism" is and what it means to celebrate and advocate rural life
• How teaching and spending time with college students shapes the songs
• What it means to use faith as "a lens and not a hammer"
• What it means to say that song is a "Dooyeweerdian" song
• What it means to say that songs should be more like sermons and less like prayers, and the relationship is between making claims and exploring possibilities

Get the album: https://fullyruralized.bandcamp.com/album/trying

Listen to the album: https://www.fullyruralized.com/trying 

More on the band: https://www.fullyruralized.com 

 

***Special thanks to Alex Priore, Jack Underwood, and the production arts team who made the event happen with excellent quality and stellar style.***

 

Lyrics to "Murmur"

You’re a murmur of starlings

Darling

All your ever-shifting parts

A work of modern art

That I cannot understand

And I can’t look away

Or convey

All my slip-sliding thoughts

All twisted up in knots

Explaining how I feel

 

So I’ll keep writing you all these love songs

All my life long

Trying to get it right

And you’ll keep asking me

Why I do it

Why I can’t quit

But I just don’t know how

It’s just like breathing now

 

I’m an old tv set

Trying to get

The picture to come in

With strips of kitchen tin

Wrapped around my ears

But it’s mostly just snow

Even though I’m giving it my best

I just haven’t got it yet

As clear as it can be

 

So I’ll keep writing you all these love songs

All my life long

Trying to get it right

And you’ll keep asking me

Why I do it

Why I can’t quit

But I just don’t know how

It’s just like breathing now

 

There’s a word that I learned

From a friend

About saying what you’ve got

By saying what it’s not

Possible to say

So then all that I know

I suppose

Of language and of rhyme

Of being and of time

Means nothing without you

 

Lyrics to "Mother Mary"

I keep trying to see the face

Of mother mary full of grace

In an apple core

In a sticky bun

In a stretch of clouds

In the setting sun

 

But all that’s there is just the flesh and peel

Just the carmeled crust and the pink and teal of harvest dust

 

I keep trying to tell you how

I have always loved you like I love you now

But my tongue gets thick and my brain brain goes slack

And all these words come out bric-a-brac

 

And all that’s there is just the metaphor

It’s not the whole of you 

It’s not the crux and core

It’s not the through and through

 

I keep trying to understand

How a dram of atoms makes the man

And the woman too

Is that the whole of us?

Just a clump of dirt?

Just a cloud of dust?

And that’s there is just some chemistry

The arithmetic of you and me

And the human heart is just a fine machine

Not a work of art filled with kerosene

Not a mystery of colossal scope

Not a duffel bag of fear and hope

Not a megaphone of love and hate

Not a talisman to keep us safe

Not a rattletrap always breaking down

Not a spiderweb 

Not a shantytown

Not a creaking bridge

Not a tank brigade

Not an oracle

Not a masquerade

Just a thing that bangs and beats and pounds

And throbs and churns and wails and sounds

And maybe all we are is dust

Maybe that’s the whole of us

 

But maybe we are magic too

Impossible and completely true

Through and through

 

Lyrics to "People are People Too"

People are people too

Just like me and you

From the tops of our heads

To the foot of our beds

People are people too

 

You seem to think they’re not

You seem to think they’re not

You treat them like things

And not human beings

But people are people too

 

Of course it’s the same for me

Of course it’s the same for me

It’s hard to admit

But I often forget

That people are people too

 

So then what can be done

So then what can be done

Just what do we need

For us to agree

That people are people too

 

People are people too

Just like me and you

From the buds of our tongues

To the air in our lungs

People are people too

 

People are really strange

People are really strange

We do what we won’t

And believe what we don’t

But people are people too

 

Sometimes they drive you nuts

Sometimes they drive you nuts

So we try to negate

With our labels and hate

But people are people too

 

Time here is really short

Time here is really short

So let’s make up a plan

To be as kind as we can

Because people are people too