Lee Bozeman - The Majesty of the Flesh

Music You Might Want to Consider - L

Growing up, the idea of band members having side projects seemed completely foreign. I mean, The Oak Ridge Boys all got along, right

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? Why would they not want to work together all of the time? I know this is a naive thought, considering I grew up in the era of every member of the Beatles producing their own music and Paul Simon existing without Art Garfunkel.

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So in my quest to find out more information about Luxury, I discovered that Lee Bozeman, the lead singer of Luxury, had carved out his own solo career without the band. The music isn’t all that divergent from Luxury, but it’s all his own, and it’s just as challenging and thought provoking. It’s almost as if he wrote a bunch of songs for Luxury, but they didn’t have time to record them, so, like Bill O’Reilly, he wrote it and did it live.

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Anyway, the first Lee Bozeman EP that I listened to is The Majesty of the Flesh

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, and it blew me away. When he sings on the title track,

Oh, the majesty of the flesh
I know it’s so complicated
It’s an idol we made, a glorious mess
Who can save us from this body of death?

I’m equal parts impressed, and nervous, looking around, hoping that nobody is catching the lyrics, which like a lot of Shakespeare’s sonnets, are poetic inuendo. What Bozeman does, is take the power of scandal from what, in the confines of matrimony is a holy act of love and sacrifice. And that’s what music and art should do; it should disarm us in ways we don’t expect, causing us to reflect on even the darkest parts of ourselves.

I think artistry in Christian circles can be an act of bravery. Often, Christian art is a pale clone of its worldly counterparts, shying away from controversy and pain for the safety of the familiar. I’m not saying that Bozeman is a prophet on par with Elijah, but he seems to be in the same business of making people feel uncomfortable.

Overall, Bozeman’s catalog of solo music is well worth a deep dive, especially if you want to be challenged by content while impressed by talent. Bozeman is a true artist, and he’s living up to the weight of his gifting. And if more bands have solo artists that do that, I’m all for people striking out on their own, without the safety net of a band surrounding them.

1. I know that this is an odd reference, but I couldn’t really think of another band from my childhood that was both absurd and didn’t seem to have any side projects. Then again, I didn’t do any research and threw their name out there. For all I know, the guy with the deep bass voice had a doom metal side project called Boom Pow Elvira or something. If he didn’t, I reserve the right to start a doom metal side project called Boom Pow Elvira, because that name is killer, if I can say so myself.

2. And Don Henley was a solo artist without Eagles and Steve Winwood wasn’t a member of the Grateful Dead. Let me just admit, I didn’t know anything until I was probably 15 or 16 years old.

3. If you haven’t seen the really old viral clip of Bill O’Reilly flipping out on the set of Inside Edition - ironically it was over introducing a song from Sting (the former lead singer of The Police) - I highly recommend it. I think my friends and I quote it on a weekly basis.

4. The title track is a not so veiled metaphor for sex, and the idol that we as a culture seem to have made of the act. Yeah, it’s not really for the faint of heart or the kids.