While the Justin Biebers and Lana Del Reys of the world have been in the thrall of “Hypepriest” Judah Smith, the underground set have been seeking wisdom from their own spiritual guide: Sister Irene O’Connor, a Franciscan nun from Australia whose 1973 album Fire of God’s Love has been sampled by mainstream-y tastemakers like James Blake and Vegyn, was featured in Killing Eve, and become an unexpected grail for crate-diggers, with original vinyl copies selling for upwards of $500 on Discogs.
A set of original spirituals performed on acoustic guitar and piano as well as early synths and drum machines, Fire of God’s Love is a truly odd bird, flitting between haunted pseudo-dub tracks, winding Masses and chirpy pop ditties. This is fitting territory for Freedom to Spend, the reissue arm of cult electronic label RVNG International, which has released wondrous long-lost synth records by Danielle Boutet and Gregory TS Walker in recent years, although telling a friend about “this awesome synth-pop record by an Australian nun” does feel a little like a parody of underground reissue fandom. And, truthfully, nothing on Fire of God’s Love could ever be mistaken for secular music.
No score yet, be the first to add.
“Fire (Luke 12:49),” the record’s best-known track, comes closest, thanks to a creaky, decaying dub rhythm seemingly at odds with Sister Irene’s hypnotic, piercing vocals, which charge through the song with an uncanny combination of weightlessness and intent. Like much of Fire of God’s Love, it is curiously unnerving; although Sister Irene ostensibly made music to both celebrate her faith and make worship sound appealing to younger generations, the song’s circuitous minor chords feel itchy and anxious, despite Sister Irene’s emphatic suggestion that God’s love will help “mankind find true peace.”
This clash of sensibilities is present in all of Fire of God’s Love’s most compelling songs: “Mass – Emmanuel,” on which Sister Irene sings the Lord’s Prayer against an increasingly frenzied synth organ, sounds almost like it could be a very gestational Stereolab demo; there is an ominous, threatening tone to “O Brother (Matt 7:1-5)” even though Sister Irene is beseeching the listener to “be a good example/Now it’s up to you!”
Your mileage will vary when it comes to such overtly worshipful music; somewhat ironically, it’s more traditional acoustic songs—like “Nature Is a Song,” about seeing Him in the rich natural world, or “Keshukoran,” which extends an olive branch to the Muslim community in Singapore and is sung in Malay—which feel the least jarring to contemporary secular ears. As a distinctly non-religious listener, I have trouble seeing much of Fire of God’s Love as anything other than an interesting and pretty curio, no matter how much a song like “Christ Our King (Col. 1:13)” might remind me of the back half of Joanna Newsom’s Divers.
This vague iffiness I feel about Fire of God’s Love has hardly inhibited me from bumping it, of course: There is universal truth in a song like “Nature Is a Song,” with its sweet, simply evocative lyrics about “the pitter-patter of the falling rain” and “the paddy fields so rich with golden grain.” I’m not sure I feel Him in those things, but I definitely feel something. Some forms of wisdom really are universal.
