PITCH: America‚s First Faith-Based Energy Drink

I thought the readers at [REDACTED] might like to hear about America’s first faith-based energy drink ˆ one that energizes your body and soul! Not only does the combination of pomegranate and grape make for an abundant taste, but 1in3Trinity also serves as a high-powered energy drink to give an extra boost any time of day. I’d love to send you some samples to try it yourself, and if you’re not the best contact for this can you let me know who is?

1in3Trinity is made of a special blend handed down from the flourishing vines and trees of the Holy Land mixed with B-vitamins, Vitamin C, herbs and antioxidants. With only 10 calories and 3 grams of sugar per serving, 1in3Trinity still manages to pack mighty flavor into every heavenly sip.

Taking its cue from Galatians 5:22, the 1in3Trinity product line is designed to empower Christians to be bold in their faith and reflect the Fruits of the Spirit to the world with confidence. For more details and high-res photos you can download, visit: www.ultimatepresspicks.com.

Please be sure to let me know if you’d like me to send you samples.

March 5 through 7, I’ll be at Booth College in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for the college’s conversation series. It’ll be two nights and two days’ worth of me yakking about the book, Christian culture and criticism of both.

March 30 & 31, I’ll head back to Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich., for the biennial Festival of Faith & Music. I wrote about the last one in the book, and I’m looking forward to, among other things, uncomfortable dinner conversation with David Dark. I’m going to present a workshop (working title: “Ironic Mind Meets Literal Mind: Does pop culture owe Christian culture anything?”)

I stole the precolonic idea from Christopher Hitchens’ God Is Not Great , an advance copy of which I’m reading and the title of which is self-explanatory. With the success of Sam Harris’ books and Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion (No. 17 on Amazon!), the appetite for these books seems to beg for a cover story in Time, at the very least. At my paper we’d give it a headline like “Creata Hatas,” but I’m sure they’ll do something classier.

Update: Thanks to Tony for noticing that I originally scheduled the interview to run for 13 hours!

My contribution:

Perhaps I’m wrong about the musical difference Christian belief might make. For instance, when I ask Andrew Beaujon, a journalist with US magazine Spin and author of Body Piercing Saved My Life, a book about Christian music in the US, he says he sees no correlation between Christianity and great Christmas music. “The greatest Christmas song of all time was written by a Jew,” he notes, referring to Irving Berlin’s ubiquitous White Christmas.

7. Speaking of which, I noticed that while you mentioned, mainly in passing, both Relevant and Paste magazines, you didn’t discuss their intersection with and impact upon the scene covered in your book. Relevant, clearly, is overt about matters, while Paste clearly tries to underplay its involvement (and gets rather defensive, I’m told, when people make inquiries into, say, its funding by the DC3 entertainment group, which of course is tied in with the Mars Hill Church - not the most liberal pew in the row, eh?). Did you attempt to talk to those publications, and what, in general, do you think the impact of the Xian music media (print or electronic) has been upon the spread, and perhaps even mainstream acceptance, of Xian rock
‘n’ roll?

And here’s what I wrote back:

I kind of doubt that a direct competitor of Paste is an appropriate venue to discuss its business practices, of which I am completely ignorant. I will add that there are many Mars Hill Churches in the country, some of them quite liberal.

And so, I thought, that was that. Yesterday I got a package from a buddy in Athens, Ga., including a couple of issues of Stomp and Stammer, an Atlanta music monthly. The October issue had a review of my book by Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Jeff Clark. The November issue included a curious letter to the editor from–wait for it–Fred Mills, who also contributes to Stomp and Stammer.

Jeff–
Re: your review of the Body Piercing Saved My Life book (Oct. 06 issue). I have to agree with you that author Andrew Beaujon (a senior writer [sic] for Spin) either overlooked or deliberately omitted some key points in his otherwise fascinating look at Christian rock music. In fact, I asked him about them.

Then Fred relays my quote about why I didn’t cover Christian Americana in my book. Whatever. I think it’s boring music. You disagree? A perfectly legitimate gripe, and a great subject for a book by someone who cares. The third graf, though, is where Fred leaves the planet:

Another thing I was curious about: While Beaujon talked with CCM magazine editor Jay Swartzendruber for his book, he didn’t really explore the role the Christian music media plays. It would have been interesting to read about, say, Relevant and Paste magazines, both of which cover Christian and general-market music but have markedly different approaches. The former prominently displays its “God, Life, Progressive Culture” motto, while Paste, owned by media organization DC3 Entertainment (which avoids being labeled “Christian” per se but has been linked with Christian organizations, including the prominent Seattle right-wing church Mars Hill), appears to take a more low-key, under-the-radar approach to its evangelical activities. Beaujon essentially declined comment and sidestepped the question by simply claiming to be “completely ignorant” of those magazines’ business practices. Perhaps he was hedging his future employment bets by not treading on any toes–after all, isn’t Spin about to go under?–but given that one of his book’s main theses is that Christian musicians are constantly facing p.r. hurdles that their mainstream counterparts don’t have to contend with, not examining media-related issues seems a huge journalistic lapse.
Fred Mills
(Asheville, NC)

I don’t write for Paste. I’ve never pitched it, and I haven’t read it much. That’s because, far from being a Christian rock magazine, Paste covers mostly Americana, alt-country and “ad-alt” contemporary–just like Harp. I’m just not interested in that kind of music. Every time I’ve looked at Paste I’ve been impressed by its overall quality of design and what seems to be thorough coverage of music I don’t follow. I don’t know anything about its funding, and I’m not aware of any “evangelical activities” on its part. Apart from the odd nod to Over the Rhine, it doesn’t cover Christian music in any way that placed it within the scope of my book. Can you imagine a Christian magazine putting a Scientologist on its cover, as Paste did with Beck on its current issue?

I’d actually planned on doing something on Relevant in my book, too, but its editor, Cameron Strang, and I didn’t get an interview scheduled in time for my deadline. I decided to focus on Christian publishing through Swartzendruber (in a later post, I’ll discuss how well that worked out!)

For Mills to ascribe me ulterior motives for that decision is ludicrous. I’m happily employed here at the Washington City Paper, and while I still write for Spin, I have no plans to go back to full-time freelancing. I appreciate Fred’s concern about my future employment, and his assumption that I know more about Paste than I’m letting on, but if he really wanted to do me a favor he could shut the hell up.

I wrote Fred last night and suggested as much. He wrote me back saying I was welcome for all the coverage he’s given my book. That’s the problem with me: I’m such an ingrate.

UPDATE: I emailed Josh Jackson, editor of Paste, to ask him about Mills’ allegations. He told me that Paste was purchased a year and a half ago by Keith Lindner, who is also a partner in DC3, which Jackson calls a coffee/music company. (Its website is pretty hard to figure out.) Lindner’s partner in DC3, Jackson says, does attend Mars Hill in Seattle. Jackson says he’s never had any editorial pressure from Lindner.

“The fact that I’m a Christian who started a rock magazine makes me something of a novelty,” he wrote, “both to Christians who’d like to wall themselves up in their own cozy, little worlds and to people who think every Christian must be part of some right-wing conspiracy trying to establish Jerry Falwell as president-for-life.”

I’m beginning to know how he feels.

Is Driscoll pulling some sort of Ann Coulter-esque performance art here?

radosh says:

Please no David Crowder. It will confirm everyone’s worst prejudices.
11/07/06 06:05 PM
DanGibson says:

I only guessed Crowder because of Beaujon’s musical crush on him in “Body Piercing”. I still have a hard time imagining anyone outside the CCM echo chamber enjoying his music.

Sorry to confirm your suspicions, but Crowder is in fact among the MP3s I chose for today’s post!

Speaking of Christian culture, anyone see this?

More tomorrow–who will it be? Pedro? Mute Math? The commenters want to know! (And, as usual, they’re calling for Daniel Amos and the 77s.)