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| From | shteevea@yahoo.com |
| Subject | Re: Recommendation Request for Good Christian Music .-) |
| Date | Mon, 5 Jul 2010 15:48:46 -0700 (PDT) |
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My references are mostly 80s, because the guy who managed the record store I worked at in college was born again; I'm not Christian but these rock and speak to me, and these bands and albums remain among my faves:
The 77s: Should have been huge; All Fall Down and their S/T album are great alternative, REM-influenced albums. The lyrics are obviously spiritual, but not quite as explicit as their later stuff, after the mainstream crossover clearly wasn't going to happen. Lead singer-songwriter-guitar slinger Mike Roe has several solo and side projects; The Lost Dogs are especially good, but anything he does is worth a listen.
Charlie Peacock: Great, soulful, jazzy pop vocalist, also torn between secular and spiritual recordings (which also too often means glossy, too slick by half production). His self-titled album on Island from '86 is really nice mainstream pop, with mature and sophisticated songwriting. His West Coast Diaries albums of unreleased tracks, demos and live acoustic performances are stellar (he produced the 77s first few albums, and they play on much of this stuff). Some of his later stuff is way too slick for me (and occasionally too heavy-handed lyrically for my taste), but he released a couple of jazz albums with folks like Marc Ribot and Bela Fleck that were cool; again, a terrific musician and songwriter I always keep tabs on.
Phil Keaggy: Jeez, another guy who is just a stellar guitar player and songwriter who too many people just don't know about. I prefer his Beatle-esque stuff (versus his instrumental side), which kicks off with The Phil Keaggy & Sunday's Child album (which is a GREAT 60s powerpop album) and continues for about another decade.
The Call: I know they had mainstream success, but man, I love Michael Been, and all of their work is deeply spiritual and probing; Reconciled and Into the Woods are just great records (though the keyboard sound dates them a bit) and they were amazing live back in the day.
Leslie (Sam) Phillips: This is really just for one album, The Turning, recorded while she was still a Christian artist by soon to be (and now ex-husband) T-Bone Burnett. Her earlier stuff - all slick CCM over-production - is virtually unlistenable, but this album is both seriously Christian and seriously great folk-pop-rock. So, of course, it was rejected by CCM, she changed her name and left the Christian music world behind, though her beliefs are often writ large on her music.
Tonio K.: Tonio (nee Steve Krikorian) released one of my favorite albums of all-time, Life in the Foodchain, in the late 70s; though I think it was not until later that he was born again, the biting satire and world view make the conversion not too surprising. He was another casualty of Christian crossover, starting on a major label, then becoming part of A&Ms What? imprint which was supposed bring hip Christian artists to the masses and failing utterly. And songs like "Too Cool to Be Christian" (which I got to see him play live to a stunned Cornerstone festival :-), pretty much closed the CCM door. Also T-Bone produced on a few records, and was able to make totally iconoclastic records with the proceeds from his songwriting with a few hits to his name for Bonnie Raitt, Joe Cocker and Sara Evans. Get Notes From the Lost Civilization and Ole.
Mark Heard: Genius who sadly died way, way too young. I guess you'd put him in the singer-songwriter bucket, but his music ranged from the synthpop he recorded as Ideaola (also on the What imprint), to jangle pop to Dylanesque folk. His music is catchy, intelligent, compassionate and heartbreaking. Saw him play a double-bill with Sam Phillips that remains one of the best show ever seen. There's a compilation called High Noon, but track down Dry Bones Dance if you can, which is a classic.
Hope you find some of these and enjoy them!
________________________________
From: Jeff Brenneman <monets_house@yahoo.com>
To: audities@smoe.org
Sent: Wed, June 30, 2010 9:56:47 AM
Subject: Recommendation Request for Good Christian Music .-)
From the vast collective knowledge that is Audities, I was hoping that there would be some that could recommend any good Christian music?
My experience with the genre has not been very promising, but I'm sure there MUST be something worth listening there somewhere, right. right????
.-)
-jeff
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