Music of Joy

When you think about it, new age is as much a sign of the times as gangsta rap, industrial music, emo, and alternative metal. A lot of the angst-ridden music of the 21st century — be it DMX, Aimee Mann, System of a Down, Limp Bizkit, or Eminem — deals with the frustrations and challenges of modern life. All of those artists are about keeping it real, to use a popular hip-hop phrase. New age artists and producers are equally aware of how frustrating life can be, but instead of using music to discuss and examine life's challenges, they use music to escape from them. And as long as people realize that life can be a total bitch, they will find different ways of coping — perhaps with the angry catharsis that Alanis Morissette and Ludacris offer, or perhaps through the total escapism of a new age disc like Jim Jenkins' Music of Joy: Songs to Enrich the Soul. This 2003 release doesn't pretend to keep it real — quite the opposite, in fact. Music of Joy is designed to make stressed-out listeners forget about reality (at least temporarily). These days, new age is moving in many different directions — some more creative than others. Some 21st century new age is surprisingly creative and substantial (Marilynn Seits, Kathy Zavada, and Lucia Hwong, for example), and some of it vacuous. Music of Joy isn't as chance-taking as some of the CDs that Seits, Zavada, and Hwong have come out with, but it isn't totally brainless either. The adjectives that are typically used to describe new age — calm, peaceful, serene, soothing — easily describe Jenkins' work, which isn't as risk-taking as it could be, but is generally pleasant. Music of Joy is what it is: an exercise in complete, total, unapologetic escapism.