What would happen if one were to mix LSD with fundamentalist Christianity? Hammock‘s Marc Byrd learned the answer when watching the moonrise and mistaking it for the apocalypse. Looking back, Byrd writes of “letting go of toxic shame and bad religion, while holding onto what is good, beautiful and true.” Rather than lamenting the delayed rapture, he writes, “Seeing and experiencing a moonrise is a miracle in itself.”
The Second Coming Was a Moonrise reimagines Christianity as a religion of seeking and sometimes finding, in which beauty possesses more power than dogma. The fact that Byrd references Philippians 4:8 in his description – and that by adding ten guests, he and Andrew Thompson end up with a group the same size…
Tag Archive: Hammock
Nevertheless is a word that Marc Byrd, half of Hammock along with Andrew Thompson, grew accustomed to hearing at funerals in the Deep South. “A loved one is gone. Nevertheless…” The word was meant to convey reflection, recalibration, a pause between considerations, as in Selah.
The duo is no stranger to sorrow and loss, which has informed their music for decades. This makes them well-suited to convey empathy, as they do throughout this recording, dedicated to a friend who lost both a son and a daughter to addiction. “Requiem for Johan” (the son) begins this journey, which is less one toward recovery than to incorporation; the track title “Like a Sadness We Get Used To” reflects this incorporation, as do Byrd’s words, “We limp on,” which might…