Have you ever liked a villain more than the hero? Who and why?
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Does anyone remember this nursery rhyme?
What are little boys made of?
Frogs and snails
And puppy-dogs' tails
That's what little boys are made of.
What are little girls made of?
Sugar and spice
And all things nice
That's what little girls are made of
As a male, in primary school, there was always the fear of being accused of being girly. So, though I tried to be good, I didn’t want to be seen as a “goody two-shoes”. And in secondary school, there was always the fear of being accused of being gay. But even apart from wanting to mix with the tough guys or bad guys, the “baddies” in movies or TV series were always interesting – be it the Riddler or Joker in Batman, Goldfinger in James Bond or whoever. And when punk rock became popular in 1977, I liked the music for its energy, but I also liked the “bad guy” image. I didn’t want to be violent or promiscuous myself, but I wanted to wear Stranglers T-shirts or Clash haircuts rather than be seen as an Abba or Saturday Night Fever fan 😀.
In some ways, it delayed my decision to commit my life to Christ. I wouldn’t have admitted it at the time, but being cool was important to me as a teen. Identifying as a “born again” Christian wasn’t cool. But I didn’t like the fact that everyone around me was baptised, confirmed, went to Mass, but showed little evidence of believing any of it – and were quite happy to keep God out of the picture. That’s what attracted me to evangelical Christians – they expressed the importance of a personal and public commitment to Christ – and being part of a community that cherished Jesus and openly followed him.
When Bob Dylan became a Christian, that gave me a little nudge towards disregarding social pressure. And a few years later, Howard Jones, who wasn’t a Christian artist, released a New Song – urging people to be themselves and to throw off their mental chains.
One of my guilty secrets from 1978 was liking Mr Blue Sky by ELO during the height of my punk period. That wasn’t anything like a nasty punk song. My favourite nasty punk song of the time was Five Minutes by The Stranglers, sung by my hero at the time, Jean Jaques Burnel. Many years later, I heard him on the radio being asked about his favourite hits from the 1970s. And he listed Mr. Blue Sky among them 😀.
And in recent years, I’ve heard king of punk, Johnny Rotten, speaking of how much he likes the Bee Gees – and Liam Gallagher saying how much he liked George Michael’s music. And punks weren’t necessarily all bad guys – no more than the softies were necessarily all good guys. Many punks had very strong moral principles. Johnny Rotten (John Lydon) looked after his wife when she had dementia.
When I became Christian at 18, I instantly liked hymns, but I could never get into Christian pop artists. I have tried at times. I’ve even heard of Christian punk bands, but it sounds very silly to me 😀. Society’s changed a lot over the last 50 years. People feel freer to be themselves. But even now, I sometimes fondly remember some of the old punky songs, especially The Undertones – but I like the old Abba songs too – and even Bye Bye Baby by the Bay City Rollers 😀. I remember hearing a documentary about them around 20 years ago. They weren’t really girl guys at all. They were tough kids from Glasgow. But because all the kids and girls liked them, we hated them 😀.
Nowadays, I see a lot more Christian rock songs – and they aren’t too bad – probably better than a lot of 21st century secular music 😀. Here are a couple of examples:
Hibernia Gospel 