A rubber band ball, meticulously constructed and then unceremoniously dropped, that’s what Outside Pedestrian’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” feels like. Not the ball itself, mind you, but the brief, elastic snap of unexpected order being momentarily… let go. We know the Bach tune. It’s a holiday staple, often served up with a side of polite reverence. But here, Anthony Fesmire’s guitar, David Lockeretz’s bass, and Steve Tashjian’s drums wrestle it into something almost unrecognizable.
It’s not disrespectful. It’s like studying a cathedral, brick by meticulous brick, then deciding it would also look great with, I don’t know, neon graffiti and a couple of skate ramps bolted to its side. The polyrhythms tangle and leap. The notes tumble out not like snow, but like loose change spilled on a cold sidewalk. There’s a driving force, like trying to chase a kite in a hurricane.
And it works! It really works. This isn’t smooth jazz. This is a controlled, beautiful explosion. Is it a Christmas single? Technically. Does it make you want to bake cookies or gather ‘round a fire? Probably not. But does it provoke thought? Yes. In the same way that a kaleidoscope reveals a pattern you never expected, “Jesu, Joy” is suddenly new, urgent, somehow less than solemn and way more important. I bet the architects of those cathedrals never expected the future to have distortion pedals. They should have though.
Sometimes, music reveals not just notes, but the potential in noise itself. What will they break next?
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