Dan Ficker

Apple TV is kinda the new HBO, anyways.

In a brightly lit office room with CD shelves behind, a rotund middle-aged white man holds a vinyl package of the Electric Jesus soundtracks as in one hand and the Electric Jesus movie Blu-Ray in another and is smiling to the camera between them.

The music, most composed by Daniel Smith and his band Danielson, lovingly pokes fun at teens, Christian subculture and rock music.

My blog post has more on this 2021 album, plus links to listen and buy online: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of the Various Artists Electric Jesus: Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture album - The background looks like wood paneling on an indoor wall. In the middle is a a very metal-looking drawing of the words 'Electric Jesus', with light green and dark brown stripes, orange letter edges, and a pastel gold halo drawn around the edges of the words. The words are in a general circle shape, and there's fake ringwear that might happen with a well-handled record to make it look retro. Along the bottom, it says 'Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture'.

Album Of The Day: Electric Jesus: Music From & Inspired By The Motion Picture

Released 5 years ago today, this is the soundtrack to an independent film. It's a comedy set in 1986 about a group of teens who start a Christian metal band & tour to spread Jesus (and make their manager some money).

Album Art of Robyn Miller's Riven: The Soundtrack album - Against the backdrop of a red sunset with a purple sky at the top, the decorative hilt of a dagger is in the foreground, with a handle with a circular design around it. In the background, surrounding the fancy dagger handle, can be seen a series of very oddly-shaped rock formations, where large rocks are sitting on very small, unlikely bits of rock as they near the ground. Beyond, by the sky, can be seen the sea.

In 2024, video game studio Cyan released a remastered version of Riven, and Robyn also released a remastered, expanded soundtrack and the new cover art is here as well.

My blog post has more on this 1998 album, plus links to listen and buy online: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of Robyn Miller's Riven: The Soundtrack album - Against the backdrop of a red sunset with a purple sky at the top, the decorative hilt of a dagger is in the foreground, with a handle with a circular design around it. In the background, surrounding the fancy dagger handle, can be seen a series of very oddly-shaped rock formations, where large rocks are sitting on very small, unlikely bits of rock as they near the ground. Beyond, by the sky, can be seen the sea.

Album Of The Day: Riven: The Soundtrack by Robyn Miller

Released 28 years ago yesterday is the soundtrack to the sequel to Myst, Riven. They are some of my favorite computer games of all time. The instrumental music for Riven is haunting, otherworldly, and it helps build suspense as you explore.

My blog post has more on this 1999 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of The O.C. Supertones's Chase The Sun album - Six young men are photographed standing on a city sidewalk with a theater marquee behind them and a metal door on the front of a shop off to their right. One of them is leaning against the metal door. They are all wearing white shirts and black ties, and suits and black pants that look a bit baggy. They're all looking at the camera with mostly blank expressions, a few slightly smiling. Above the photo the top fifth vertically is a bright blue, with 'The Orange County' printed in small, orange text, and then 'Supertones' printed in much larger white text in a stylized cursive-ish font. At the bottom of the photo it has 'Chase The Sun' printed in smaller, uppercase letters in the bottom right.

Album Of The Day: Chase The Sun by The O.C. Supertones

Released 27 years ago today is the 3rd album from this rock/ska band & my favorite album of theirs. It might not be the fan favorite because it's a bit more pop & surf rock than their other albums, but I think it's their best work. It's fun.

From the U2 "Propaganda" zine about the new EP, this is said:

"[...]U2 have been writing and recording on and off ever since the final Sphere show in March 2024. The EP is the band's first set of new songs since 2017. The album is not far behind, which doesn't include any of these tracks."

It looks like the streaming version is a bit of a "Deluxe" version and includes 4 bonus tracks that I'm not sure even I've listened to yet.

My blog post has more on this 1996 album, plus links to listen and buy online: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of Phil Keaggy's Acoustic Sketches album - The artwork is based on a black-and-white photo of Phil Keaggy playing an acoustic guitar. The original picture is shown in the area of his face and both left and right hands. But the rest of the photo is altered to be a light brown background, and what looks like the edges of the whole photo of him playing is embossed in the brown. In the top towards the right, there is a black box that says the artist name in smaller red text on the top and bottom, and the album title in larger, yellow text in the middle.

Album Of The Day: Acoustic Sketches by Phil Keaggy

Released 30 years ago sometime this month, this is the fourth instrumental album by Phil. It's an hour of him playing beautiful acoustic guitar in a studio. He is a guitar master as he coaxes so many different sounds out of the instrument.

Oh, The Violet Burning commented on this post on FB and let me know I got a few things wrong. They were never a church worship band like I thought. My mistake! Thanks for letting me know.

I've only watched the first two seasons so far, but yes, Jackson Lamb definitely doesn't seem to get stressed easily. He's always got a good comeback too.

My blog post has more on this 1996 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of The Violet Burning's self-titled album - On a red and black background, a vertical photo of a young girl is in the middle. It's a young black girl wearing pigtails and a purple bathing suit, I think. She's also got what looks like wire and cloth angel wings attached to her back. She's holding a bright red ball in her right hand out towards the camera and has he left hand up behind her head. She's looking down at the camera in a quizzical way. On top of the photo, about three quarters down vertically, a black line goes across and printed in it is the band's name in white text. Behind that black line is the band's name also scribbled in aqua blue paint or thick pen.

Album Of The Day: The Violet Burning by The Violet Burning

Released 30 years ago yesterday is this 3rd album from the alternative rock band. Like many albums from this era, it has a lots of distorted guitars & that "grunge" sound. With this, this church band made their way into underground rock.

Album Art of Iona's Journey Into The Morn album re-release - A photo of an ancient stone cross through a circular portal of some sort. The edges of the portal are blurry, and the color of the stone seems to be shades of purple somehow. Printed on top of the photo in the center towards the top is the band's name in a white, handwritten-style font, their normal word mark. And printed at the bottom middle is the album title in a sans-serif font, thin and white, all in lowercase.

Included in the previous post is the original album art featuring a band photo and here's the newer artwork for the band's 2009 independent re-release.

My blog post has more on this excellent 1995 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of Iona's Journey Into The Morn album - The background looks like a purple ground, an orange skyline, maybe a sunset, and greyish-purple clouds at the top. Over most of the background is a clear globe, which distorts things. Inside this globe can be seen a photo of six people, a woman on the left and 5 men, most looking off in the distance. The globe kinda distorts their photo as well. Behind the band can be seen a Celtic calligraphy design of some sort, maybe a cross.

Album Of The Day: Journey Into The Morn by Iona

Released 30 years ago today in the US and a few months earlier in the UK, this is the 4th album by Celtic progressive rock band Iona. It's a beautiful, cinematic 78 mins of music, including guitars, drums, pipes & singer Joanne Hogg's heavenly vocals.

Released on this day 30 years ago, my favorite Newsboys album.

lol, love it.

My blog post has more on this 1996 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of Audio Adrenaline's Bloom album - The background seems to be some sort of shiny, brushed steel surface. In a font that looks like scratched metal, the band's name is at the top with a bit of a dark shadow around the lettering. In the bottom vertically and centered in the middle horizontally, a red sunflower graphic is over the background with a muted drop shadow. In the middle of the sunflower in lowercase is the album title in white, with the last 'o' bigger than the rest of the letters.

Album Of The Day: Bloom by Audio Adrenaline

Released 30 years ago tomorrow, this is the 3rd album by this Christian rock/pop band & my favorite album of their discography. The band wears their religion on their sleeve, but they still put together a good classic rock album with hints of grunge.

My blog post has more on this 2026 EP, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

It doesn't get added to your iTunes account automatically this time, so check it out only if you want to.

Album Art of U2's Days Of Ash EP - Four men are silhouetted by purple and white artwork above them, looking down at a camera from the edges. Behind them, the edges are purple and the middle is white, and there's a fairly simple line drawing of angels shown. At the top, printed is 'U2 Days Of Ash EP' in all uppercase, black text.

Album Of The Day: Days Of Ash by U2

Released today, this is surprise new music from Irish rock band U2. As they often do, Bono & the band get political, in this case honoring & celebrating people from across the world who fought for truth & freedom. Fans & critics seem to be liking this new music.

I thought I knew what my Album Of The Day would be. But well, I guess you never know what might show up to listen to.

My blog post has more on this 2007 album, plus links to listen online: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of The Showdown's Temptation Come My Way album - The artwork is all black, with a black-and-grey snakeskin pattern covering it. Across the middle vertically, it says the band's name in big black letters with a grey outline, the letters taller than they are wide and with spikey corners at the bottom of the letters. Just above the band name, the album title is printed in small grey text.

Album Of The Day: Temptation Come My Way by The Showdown

Released 19 years ago this coming Friday, this is the 2nd album by the Tennessee-based metal band & their only album I listen to regularly. This doesn't have a lot of screaming & plays a lot like a classic metal album in sound. I love it.

My blog post has more on this 2021 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...

Album Art of Jon Foreman's Departures album - On a light brown paper background, the center is a black-and-light-brown photo of a man with blonde hair, just his face. He has a blank expression and light brown color is painted across his eye level. Below the photo, it says the artist name in black, and the album title 'Departures' in a hand-written lowercase.

Album Of The Day: Departures by Jon Foreman

Released 5 years ago this past Thursday, this is his 1st solo album though he has been releasing solo EPs for many years & has been the lead singer of Switchfoot for nearly 30 years. It's good, thoughtful acoustic pop/rock with some spiritual leanings.

Huh. Never heard of this movie. I think I was kinda checked out of pop culture for a few years around that time, though.

My blog post has more on this 1991 album, plus links to listen on streaming services: da-man.com/blog/202602/...