Joy Electric

Ronnie Martin is the Joy Electric, a one-man army of technical skill in electronic music and a pioneer Christian artist. His ample career is buoyed by a songbook of strong melodies, cutting-edge production design, and progressive poetry. It’s a shame his music still exists on the outer fringe of the Christian scene, often ignored simply because of its weirdness.

Ironically, it’s his introductory material that seemed to fit so well with the Christian “agenda.” Intense, overt religious lyricism laced almost every track, particularly on the album ChristianSongs. The biggest complaint with that outlook is that it leaves no legroom for uninitiated listeners, even believers: we’re all clubbed over the head with a series of almost-sermons, upbeat and electronic in nature, but still a bit too forward for real enjoyment. Besides, Martin’s real talents are rarely put on display in such affectations. He’s a poet at heart, a man with an innate knack for sewing together ideas and pictures in his words.

With the advent of The White Songbook, Martin began a more oblique approach, favoring spoken poems and overlapping loops that build ad infinitum. His purist leanings allowed for a complex final product; these compositions sound big – despite shaving off unnecessary technology in an attempt to recapture electronic music at its most objectively “organic.” When a track stands out, it’s a feat of great songwriting, not just productive sheen.

There are stumbles too, unfortunately, with attempts like “The Boy Who Never Forgot,” which is just too damned stark for its own good. The contrast of bright melody and harsh recording sound great on paper, butthey’re a total mess in juxtaposition. “A New Pirate Traditional” is just as embarrassing, with a club-like trance beat and repetitive vocal lines that could have been done by any electronic artist.

With the transition to Hello Mannequin, Martin seems in a brighter mood, his lyricism playfully picking at the seams of The Man/The Establishment, which is what all punk music purports to do, though not with the smile that covers this work so broadly. “Post Calendar” is club-ready, as is “I am a Pioneer,” in spite of the heavy ideas they convey. On the flipside are tracks like “A Page of Life,” which is nothing if not a ballad at heart, with a melody that I imagine would sound right at home on a folk album, complete with strings and piano.

Between Hello Mannequin and The White Songbook is the kicker, the rather odd Tick Tock Treasury, a concept album with a vague outline set in a fantasy kingdom that has more in common with a Swiss fairytale than Tolkien or Lewis. The liner notes lay out the details, and the emotional subtext is brought about with childlike playfulness and bright, colorful tones. Much like The Beatles’ Revolver rests between Rubber Soul and Sgt Pepper, once upon a time overshadowed by the brashness of those two albums, Tick Tock risks fading into the background, neither as technical as White Songbook nor as “Depeche Mode-lite” as Hello Mannequin.

“Such as it Was” is the great single standout, with its dark bass and synths that tilt back-and-forth, this way and that on the musical scale. Samples crash in the distance, and Martin’s voice seems refrained, less tinny but also less projected, soft and gentle. “The Confectionary” and “Saint Glockenspiel’s Science Fair” would both seem fit in a children’s toy shop at Christmas time – energetic and full of life, with an underlying innocence and simplicity. Martin isn’t going for grand statements; he winds up these notes like a clock and watches as they turn, intersecting with other sounds, with his voice, with his lyrics.

It’s remarkable, then, that Tick Tock has no equal in the Joy Electric discography – no later LP captures that brightness again, and no earlier release manages it quite so effectively. It stands, dropped in the middle of two musically complex, artistically ambitious albums, an anomaly that could very well be Martin’s strongest work, if only because of its random appearance and solid ideas, explored so deeply and yet with such finesse and no-lead in. It’s electronic music for people who don’t “do” electronic music – for your kids, for holidays, birthdays, and parties. None of it belongs in a club. It’s a “headphones album.”

After Hello Mannequin, there was a massive shift in sound on The Ministry of Archers, ending what Martin himself describes as “The Legacy Recordings” and acting as a bridge toward the latest two compositions, written on Moog synthesizers. Archers tends to be a bit bland in stretches, and it’s also fairly short in length, making the experience a little underwhelming. The opening is vintage Joy Electric, a sound-off of various effects, with vocals setting a mood by repetition of the lines “ahh, ahh, ahh, ahh, ahh, ahh, fam-uh-lee.” Melodies are strong, but for some reason, this project just doesn’t stick to the brain stem as effectively as other efforts.

Successes? “A Hatchet A Hatchet” has great poetry (“Prescription, when to rest, when to un-rest”) delivered with a wink. And “Quite Quieter Than Spiders” is an epic win for its baroque-striving overindulgence of bombast. The whole thing sounds very self-important, and even the lyrics are more pretentious than usual. All certainly “in the know.” If I were you, I would still avoid “Hornets Horns” and “In Intricacies” – the former goes nowhere, and the latter, while offering an interesting series of clicks and whirrs, doesn’t exactly deliver much emotional punch.

“The Moog Dynasty” is set in motion with The Otherly Opus and firmly established in sonic approach by My Grandfather, The Cubist. With the former, we get a lot of toying with the ideas – a noise here, a melody there; the two rarely converge. “Frivolity and its Necessities” is a rare exception – Martin playing the choir backup to himself, a tempo that’s neither fast nor slow, and paced, methodical lyrical delivery. “The Ushering of the Magical Era” is the opposite sign of the coin – mechanical vocals, little melody to note, and an oddly placed drum beat that’s more fit for a club than anything else on the album.

The Otherly Opus is a bit darker than previous work, with a certain intensity that ditches the plodding punk of earlier projects and a violent melancholy – coming from a place so far removed from Tick Tock’s color it could have been recorded by a different artist entirely. Versatility is a concept Martin could teach to many others in the business today; he changes skins constantly, etching smiles on faces with one album, causing lovelorn hearts to reflect on another… and sometimes, on both.

Which brings us to My Grandfather, The Cubist. It’s a bit more aggressive than Opus, more densely layered, but not as mechanical as say, The White Songbook, and poppier. “The First Time I Loved Her it was Here” is a great example, full of life and energy without leaving behind the production techniques that stun.

The songwriting tack is so far removed from where Martin started, and there’s nothing remotely as religiously forward as ChristianSongs or even Robot Rock. These images take patience to embrace and understand, but it’s much better than the earlier material…Martin as a poet? That’s something I can get used to. He’s not a preacher, and the “Children of the Lord” – style lyricism is something I never embraced.

The operative word with Joy Electric is “change.” Change for better, change for worse, just change. Sometimes I don’t think Martin even knows why he changes… but one thing’s for certain, stale will never categorize his music. The moment ideas and techniques become familiar, they’re replaced with new ones. Again, this isn’t to suggest that his work is always improving. Matter of fact, while later albums are certainly much better than ChristianSongs or Melody, that’s not exactly hard; the hang-ups come when albums like Ministry of Archers fail to excite due to short length or lack of actual songs. It’s a new musical approach, sure, but to what end?

At the end of the day, sometimes its better to play it conservatively – if not in production design, then certainly in songwriting tack. There’s nothing wrong with verses and choruses and that age-old arrangement that’s so familiar and inviting. Challenging listeners can be a real treat for both the artist and the audience, but sometimes the experiments fall flat.

Experience is the best teacher, and Ronnie Martin has a lot of it. Previous few failures aside, his is a milestone in “music made by Christians” for his unwillingness to simply accept the norm, and also for introducing an underground genre of music to a relatively cooped up population of believers – not to mention doing so with such finesse and grace. Hats off to you.

• www.joyelectric.com
• www.myspace.com/joyelectric

↓ 28 comments

#1 John Wamfford on October 25th, 2009 at 3:03 am

“There are stumbles too, unfortunately, with attempts like “The Boy Who Never Forgot,” which is just too damned stark for its own good.”

What? you’re taste is surely lacking if you don’t like The Boy Who Never Forgot. I’m speechless.

#2 John Wilfford on October 26th, 2009 at 10:18 pm

You are completely wrong. Joy electric is as stale as it gets. I used to be so excited about new joy electric, but now it is just stale stale stale. The only that changes anymore is what retarded historical figure he sings about

#3 Derek on October 27th, 2009 at 3:25 am

I agree for the most part with this article but I think The Ministry Of Archers is his best album, it does not “fail to excite due to short length or lack of actual songs”. Its the darkest, and the bass on most songs excite me, and the drums..I like the beats, I likey a lot.

#4 John Wutfford on October 27th, 2009 at 4:53 am

The Otherly Opus was the end of the legacy series. Also The Ministry of Archers is easily one of Joy Electric’s best albums.

#5 John Whamford on October 27th, 2009 at 3:24 pm

I think he should have ended Joy Electric after the White Songbook. It would have been a grand finally. Aside from maybe Workmanship and Montgolfier And The Romantic Balloons the “Legacy Series” is just rubbish. You don’t name your own legacy, it’s given to those that deserve it. And now a covers album???

#6 John Woofford on October 27th, 2009 at 10:06 pm

this article is just a mad lib with joy electric titles thrown in and random adjectives

#7 John Wofford on October 28th, 2009 at 6:43 pm

Mr Woofford/Whamford/Wutfford/Wilford/Wamfford:

I’ve got to say, whether you intended to do so or not, your comments have absolutely made my week a brighter one.

That out of the way, if randomly posted comments devoid of grammatical precision, appropriate spelling (”grand finally”? really?), and/or intelligent phrasing are your means of conveying concepts, then something is severely broken in your understanding of artistic analysis.

Moreover, if this is an attack on myself, feel free to continue. I look forward to further updates.

John

#8 dj cimino on October 28th, 2009 at 9:36 pm

“Ironically, it’s his introductory material that seemed to fit so well with the Christian “agenda.” Intense, overt religious lyricism laced almost every track”

Makes me wonder if you have even listend to the pre CS albums… what!?

#9 Brenden on October 29th, 2009 at 2:23 am

If only I got such hilarious criticism.

#10 dr. m on October 29th, 2009 at 5:27 pm

You should read the thread about this article on the Joy Electric board. Maybe you’ll learn that when you do big retrospectives of an artist as if you know what you’re talking about, all the while making it painfully obvious that you don’t, you tend to piss off the fans of said artist. Much of this article is your just your opinion, that’s true. It would just be nice if any of your opinions had any founding in reality.

#11 Fred on October 29th, 2009 at 10:54 pm

I don’t know Mr. Wofford, and so have no interest in attacking him personally. However, this article is really bad. Much of it is simply wrong, and the rest is misleading. The author loses all credibility by the end of the third paragraph, by which time he’s managed to call analog, monophonic production from the late 70s and early 80s “cutting edge production design”, claim that “intense, overt religious lyricism laced almost every track” pre-TWSB, and extrapolate the opening track of that album to the entire album, so that he can say that Ronnie “favored spoken poems” on it.

By the close of the review, he’s said that a post-punk track has a “a club-like trance beat”, managed to point out an intentionally Kraftwerkian song as an example of NOT being mechanical (The First Time I Loved Her It Was Here), talked about how an album entirely about losing friends and being ignored and forgotten finds Ronnie in “a brighter mood” (Hello, Mannequin).

To an artist whose stated mission is “progress without change”, he affixes the label of “change for no reason.” The advice he offers to a person who repeatedly declares himself to be devoted to writing classic pop songs is to cut back on the experimental songwriting.

Very strange.

#12 Andrew Greenhalgh on October 29th, 2009 at 11:38 pm

The one irony I really find here, and props to you Fred for not attacking Mr. Wofford personally, is that John wrote this with a heartbeat for Joy Electric and Ronnie Martin, not against…Hate to see what happens to someone who truly doesn’t like the music…

#13 dr. m on October 30th, 2009 at 2:09 am

By the way, to address several different commentators as a single person and then defend your article by telling them they have bad grammar doesn’t exactly earn your credibility back as a writer.

#14 John Wofford on October 30th, 2009 at 3:45 pm

This is extraordinary, and just makes my week better and better. No greater way to bring in Shabbat with a bit of comedy.

Kudos to you all, good folks!

#15 John Woolford on October 30th, 2009 at 3:46 pm

Andrew… If John truly didn’t like the music but wrote a good article… I think most of us wouldn’t care. It’s just that he is so wrong about so much stuff.

John bunched all of Ronnie’s pre-Legacy stuff into one group… Blatant Christian songs. And only about half of the songs on ChristianSongs were laced with “overt religious lyricism”.

#16 Fred on October 30th, 2009 at 4:01 pm

Sorry, I fail to recognize the humor that’s clearly inherent in my comment, and the commentators before me. Perhaps you could explain it to me after you address the issues I raised? I’d be particularly interested in hearing about Ronnie’s overtly Christian lyrics pre-ChristianSongs.

#17 John Witfford on October 30th, 2009 at 5:03 pm

hehehe, I love that defense mechanism that people so often use on the internet. When people disagree with you or criticize something you have done, just pretend to laugh about it and say it made your day. LOL I am immune to your comments, nothing can hurt me because I find them amusing!

#18 John Wofford on October 30th, 2009 at 5:31 pm

Quick, someone is wrong on the internet!

Strike force, go!

Crack out the dictionaries and get the jugular.

#19 dr. m on October 30th, 2009 at 7:29 pm

Oh, I forgot it’s just the internet. You can say anything you want on the internet. =/ Ask me if I’m going to be reading any more articles from THIS website…

#20 Andrew Greenhalgh on October 31st, 2009 at 11:06 am

Just jumping back in here again to say that, agree or disagree with John, one thing that’s clearly evident here is that Joy Electric/Ronnie Martin definitely has some truly devoted fans. That alone says a lot about the man and his music…And Dr. M? We’d hate to see you write us off after one disagreement but either way I do appreciate your taking the time to stop by. Thanks for your input…

#21 Matt Conner on November 2nd, 2009 at 1:20 pm

Yeah I’m not sure how this one helps from you, John, in terms of contributing to the conversation

#22 Matt on November 2nd, 2009 at 2:13 pm

Yeah, you kind of lost credibility when you claimed that everything pre-TWSB was laced with overt spiritual lyrics.

#23 John Wofford on November 2nd, 2009 at 4:40 pm

Matt,

I’ve got to admit – I blew the guy off. It’s a bit difficult to approach a discussion objectively when its conclusion has already been mapped out for you: “I’d like to see what you think, John, but this article is just so bad.”

Moreover, having spoken to a few objective parties, I’d still stand by the premise I established in the article itself – namely, that this is one guy (myself) articulating a viewpoint that no one (apart from myself) may hold. It’s an analysis. A critical one, held subjectively.

No one must agree.

That being said, let me play nice and thank everyone for stopping by, for better or worse.

#24 MWorrell on November 4th, 2009 at 11:40 pm

Not tracking with this writer. Doesn’t really seem to grasp the genre or the artist in question. But, thanks for bringing attention to a great electronic artist, even if the article doesn’t make any sense to me personally.

#25 Rebekah on November 12th, 2009 at 8:04 pm

I have no opinion about the article, but Mr. Wofford’s attitude in the comments are enough to make me wonder why I would even want to consider the article as something worth reading in seriousness.

#26 Rebekah on November 12th, 2009 at 8:05 pm

Hm, there is a typo in my comment. I suppose that is not suitable for the internet.

#27 John Wofford on November 13th, 2009 at 2:12 am

Rebekah:

I hate to hear that my attitude would turn you off from considering the article’s merits, if it has any.

Let me say I’m completely cool with criticism that meets a few qualifications:

1) It doesn’t attack me (or whatever writer) as a person.

2) It doesn’t assume some sort of intellectual high ground right out of the chute. [read: I don't take too kindly with having my words written off immediately by saying "This is horrible; you have no taste," etc., BEFORE launching into an actual discussion of the material.]

3) It’s willing to see both sides of an argument, even if it remains firm in its premise.

The complainers parody my name instead of entering their own into the comment box (with only a couple exceptions — Dr M and Fred), accuse me of tastelessness, and then ask me to begrudge them an explanation of my opinions, all the while taking my response (namely, to laugh and shrug it off as I’m used to after a couple years writing about things people feel strongly over and tend to criticize me for) as further evidence of what a jerk I must be.

Bottom line, I’ve been called an idiot, tasteless, “destined for the fires of hell”, an ass, etc., over the course of my couple years in writing. The criticism with this article is no different. How else am I supposed to respond? I’d rather laugh it off than let it destroy me.

#28 jjmini on November 17th, 2009 at 5:16 am

I think its safe to say that EVERYONE is in the wrong here.

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