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[I-TUNES REVIEWS]
[MYSPACE]
Village Thrift: Excavating ancient poetry from it's cultural context and reassembling it using the musical context of today to preserve it's truths for posterity.
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9.02.2007
Project Update
Songwriting has commenced for the new Village Thrift recording. We should have plenty of material for you all to work with by the time we release the tracks to you for your creative genius. Between 3 writers, we have about 40 song ideas so far to sort through and choose which ones to develop further. My friend, DJ Doc (Harrill), and I are pretty excited about some of the collaborative alliances that are being made both here in Cleveland and abroad. We're dreaming big dreams at this point, and I'd imagine the credits will be a lengthy list of friends by the release date of this latest Village Thrift installment.
 Let me say this, that the Psalms have never seemed so relevant in light of the issues we are facing around the world and in our own back ally. I think I'm personally starting to understand David and his wildly creative collaboration between Psalmists who were about singing to God about the issues that surrounded them in that time. They didn't wax elloquent in pouring out their hearts to the Lord, nor did they feel bashful about airing out their dirty laundry in the corporate setting. Another thing I'm remembering is that before we had what we now know as the Bible, God was speaking to and through mortals like David, who were simply responding to what they were hearing. They created a bunch of songs, that have been added to the Bible, and the rest is history. We who now have the Bible, refer to these now as the "Word of God". I wonder how David and the psalmists would have responded in the creative process had they known their music would be documented as the God's word to future generations. I wonder how they would have fealt knowing that only the lyrics would endure and that future generations would only be familiar with these songs divorced from their original musical and cultural context. Pray for us, as we now excavate this ancient poetry from it's cultural context and reassemble it using the musical context of today to preserve it's truths for posterity.
Todd Berger
8.02.2007
For Immediate Release
New Circa Recording In Production
 Todd Berger and several friends have begun writing new material for the next Village Thrift recording. These will be recorded as basic song elements (ie. lead vocal, basic instrumentation, musical hooks) that we would like, you and the greater EWC community, to have the opportunity to add their musical style, beats, arrangements to in order to complete each song. The basic song elements will be made available for download on this website and will need to be completed in a to-be-determined resolution to maintain quality and consistency for the entire project. We will soon determine the timeframe for you to submit your final tracks back. All creative mixing and additions will be done gratis, however, if we chose your song to be added to the next Village Thrift recording, you will be fully credited for your work both in all of the CD packaging and also throughout all print and web promotions of the recording. In the true sense of collaboration, we reserve the right to make artistic changes to your files for the final mix as well as determine which tracks will or will not be included in the final compilation. All submissions will be mixed and mastered for the recording.
If you would be interested in participating, please send an email to Todd Berger. IMPORTANT: write "THRIFTme" in the subject line of your email.
(FEATURING: BEN & ROBIN PASLEY, TODD BERGER, RYAN LOTT, & DJ DOC)
2005
What happens when you revisit the foundation of the original Enter the Worship Circle series, but foster collaboration with artists who speak the musical languages of cultures outside the spectrum of tribal drums and acoustic guitars?
Village Thrift has been constructed from the existing foundation of it's sister Worship Circle recordings, and though sharing the name of it's predecessors, this sibling has opened a new doorway altogether for experimentation in techniques used in cultivating environments of worship. With collaborative songwriting and acoustic instrumentation interchanged with discovered (thrift) sounds manipulated electronically, Enter the Worship Circle has purposefully hijacked technologies that have up to this point been used exclusively by DJ's, Art-Rock, and Hip-Hop artists. Take a little pop melody work from Moby, a little ambient rhythm from the Telefon Tel Aviv, add some offbeat elements like sympohonic rock from the Art of Noise, and finish it off with the voices of Ben and Robin Pasley and newcomers Todd Berger and Ryan Lott and you are starting to feel the vibe of Village Thrift.
| AUDIO SAMPLES |
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1. Simple |
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| 2. Make Me Feel |
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| 3. How Sweet |
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| 4. With Your Eyes |
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| 5. Understand |
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| 6. Twenty Two |
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| 7. All You Angels |
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| 8. Strong Weakness |
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| 9. First Hint |
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| 10. In This World |
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| 11. Wake Up Sleepy |
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| 12. Tambourines |
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| 13. Be Still |
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Circa 2005, the first in the Village Thrift series, is a wide-eyed journey that explores themes of doubt in our failure-prone humanity, and our absolute dependence on God's sufficiency in times when we find our faith to be thin. In the book of Psalms, King David has left a trail for us of abolute honesty and vulnerability in approaching the Holy One-- evidence of God's ability to receive all who will come as they are. These songs are inspired directly from those Psalms, and in keeping with the original Worship Circle series, this album is a "must have" for any Worship Circle fans.
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Todd has been developing prophetic music and art for sharing Christ with student culture for over 13 years. In 1997, Todd and his wife Laurel made a decision to focus on leading worship events that sponsor intimacy and facilitate the prophetic flow through the arts. They enjoy creating multi-art events where a fusion of visual art, dance, acoustic instrumentation, and electronica come together for an intense time of worship. Todd and Laurel have a passion for ministering to students and love to partner with campus ministries leading Enter the Worship Circle events. Todd enjoys his local role as Worship Arts Director for multi-cultural NewSong Church and as missionaries with Wake Arts Collective, Todd and Laurel are pioneering a creative community with missional partners Ryan and Jennifer Lott and Doc and Anne Harrill in their hometown of Cleveland, OH.
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Ryan grew up studying diverse compositional and performance styles, from classical to rock to jazz. He earned his Bachelor of Music in Composition at the Indiana University School of Music in 2001. He now lives in Cleveland with his wife, Jennifer, where he actively composes, performs, and produces multimedia art events. Although Ryan performs as a solo pianist, he has developed a reputation as an intuitive, versatile, and zealous collaborator. His work, unbounded, composed for NYC's Gina Gibney Dance, received critical acclaim in the New York Times. Ryan's audiovisual installation, bornwaking, created with area video and performance artist Mike Jones, was recently featured in SPACES gallery's Beautiful Dreamer exhibition. Two events, both titled CONNECT: A Multimedia Party in 3 Acts, were Ryan's latest large-scale collaborative productions, involving over 30 Cleveland-based artists from a variety of disciplines at Cleveland Public Theatre. His recent creative partnerships with choreographers and dance companies include Gina Gibney Dance (NYC), Cleveland Contemporary Dance Theatre (Cleveland), At Marah Dance Theatre (Philadelphia), Steve Rooks (formerly of the Martha Graham Dance Co., NYC), Inlet Dance Theatre (Cleveland), Groundworks Dance Theater (Cleveland), and Dance Ad Deum (Houston). In 2005, Ryan was awarded an Ohio Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship, and his music was featured in the Works & Process Series at the Guggenheim Museum, NYC. This year, Ryan became the Cleveland Arts Prize Emerging Artist Award Recipient.
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