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The Stories Behind the Songs on This Single
Fri., Apr. 5. 2024 4:29pm EDT
J. Jackson, lead singer and lyricist for ApologetiX here again.
Here are the stories behind the songs on our seventh single of 2024:
GREATER LOVE
I got the title for "Greater Love" in the early days of ApologetiX and always thought it would be a cool parody to attempt someday, so it had been on my radar for at least 30 years. Tom Milnes didn't know that, but on August 14, 2023, he specifically suggested "Radar Love" as a song he'd like to do with us. He plays all guitars and bass on this recording.
Tom recorded his guitar parts at Rich's studio the same day I recorded my vocals with Jimmy — March 26, 2014. Earlier that morning, I was reading an autobiography called Twice Adopted by former President Ronald Reagan's son Michael and came across this paragraph on page 280:
"In John 3:16, Jesus describes God's redeeming love for us in these words: 'For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.' And in John 15:12-13, he goes on to tell us that we should love one another — our husbands, wives, parents, kids, neighbors, fellow church members, friends, enemies, everyone — with the same kind of redeeming love that God showed us: 'My command,' Jesus said, 'is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.'"
It was amazing to read that right before I was scheduled to sing "Greater Love," since those were the two main scripture passages that inspired it (although there are others alluded to in the song but not specifically cited).
LOWLY BOY
On Tuesday, October 17, 2023, while I was in the studio with ApX drummer Jimmy "Vegas" Tanner, he asked about us possibly spoofing "Lonely Boy" by Andrew Gold. I'd liked that song ever since I first heard it in 1977, although I always thought the titular character was a bit of a brat, and I was never satisfied with the way the story resolved in the third verse.
Anyway, Jimmy's suggestion set the wheels in motion. While writing this journal entry, I found the following text that I had sent him that same night:
"Hey, Jimmy! You know how I said we could possibly do 'Lowly Boy' for Andrew Gold's 'Lonely Boy' and make it be about how David went from being a lowly shepherd boy to becoming king? Well, I just realized that the first part can be about David, and then the twist is that later in the song it'll be about the birth of Jesus, who was also born into lowly circumstances and grew up to be King. I'm pumped."
I had the lyrics finished by the end of that weekend. Jimmy recorded the drums in December, Rich and Wayne did the keyboards and guitars in January, and Tom Milnes and I did the bass and vocals in March. David said this about the lowly:
"Though the LORD is exalted, he looks kindly on the lowly; though lofty, he sees them from afar" (Psalm 138:6). When I mention David's birth and Psalm 51 in the first line of "Lowly Boy," I am specifically alluding to verse 51:5: "Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me."
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