Glory in the Highest

Last night we went to see Shane and Shane, Phil Wickham, and Bethany Dillon in concert for their joint Christmas tour. We were a little bummed when we showed up late and missed about half of Phil Wickham's (way too short) set, but pleased that he later joined the rest of the crew, playing bass for some Christmas jams. We were surprised on a couple of accounts at the show: #1 - Shane Barnard and Bethany Dillon are married. Which seemed especially weird because when we first heard Bethany Dillon she was 17, and Shane B has always been our senior (she is 21 now, so it's ok after all). Didn't see that one coming, and the curveball meant that the first opening act we feared to miss a bit of was Phil, not Bethany. We love her music as well, but that was a let-down to those of us who are a bit over-obsessed with Phil Wickham's sweet tunes. Surprise #2 was the discovery that Phil was born in 1984. That means he's younger than us. You know that point where you start to realize that you're aging? We first noticed it when we graduated from college and all of our favorite sports stars were the same age or younger (though they seemed much more physically mature), now we've realized that a favorite musician we sit around listening to is our junior.

If you haven't listened to these artists, you should.
-Phil Wickham has a free album available for download on his website: singalong. (*note: download is currently unavailable until jan 1, 2010)
-Shane and Shane have a fan website, where you can hear some of their songs and get guitar chords and lyrics (they are a lot of fun to play on the guitar).
-Bethany Dillon's website can link you to her stuff, check it out. She's a great songwriter.
Also, if you like Christmas music, go buy Shane and Shane's Christmas Album, "Glory in the Highest", released last year. It's unique and good.

The other fun part of last night was my discovery of a new drum toy now on my wish list: The Remo Mondo Snare. It's basically like Remo took their standard djembe, cut it off just below the head, and then attached a snare bottom to it. This is a wonderful discovery for me, as I often swap the snare on my kit with my Remo Djembe to get a more percussive wordly feel. With the Remo Mondo Snare I hope to one day have the best of both worlds and less of equipment to cart around! And a snare mixed with the Mondo head just has a great and distinct sound to it.