Why I Might Become a Fan of Hillsong (part 2 of 2)

In my last post, I covered all the reasons why I did not like Hillsong for the longest time. Those of you that are Hillsong fans may be wanting to ask me a lot of questions, but I am confident that many of them will be answered in the following words.

Leading worship over the past few years has shown me one of the coolest things about Hillsong: it is an incredible resource for churches around the world. No other worship band that I know of could write at least ten new songs each year and not have them all be awful. If a church were to use Hillsong exclusively as their song catalog for worship, they would have an extremely robust selection of songs to sing.

My perception of United has begun to change over the past couple years. Specifically, their 2013 studio album Zion is what changed my view of Hillsong in general. On Zion was a collection of songs that were God-focused and wildly original in their music. It was almost unrecognizable as a Hillsong album due to their house Brit-pop sound being exchanged for eighties synth-pop. It is easily the album that has caught me the most off-guard in the past several years and is one of the best worship records I have ever listened to.

After listening to Zion, I decided to take a second look at Hillsong and their musical offerings. The most recent albums released by Live have been generally improving but still feel behind United. Their best album to date is last year's Glorious Ruins due to its more advanced music and truly worshipful lyrics. I may not have it on my top ten list of all time, but it is the only album by Live I can listen to from beginning to end without skipping a track. That is truly a feat.

Since 2010, Hillsong has begun to add more bands to its roster. One of the more intriguing additions is the Chapel series. It takes popular songs previously recorded by Hillsong and remakes them in a minimal acoustic setting. This has been an amazing resource to me as a worship leader because I have needed to see how to work complicated music into a small setting.

A second group Hillsong has added in the past year is Young & Free. Essentially what they do is EDM worship music. It sounds like an odd combination, but somehow it just works well. Outside of Zion, Young & Free's debut album is Hillsong's best because it takes EDM and melds it with worshipful lyrics, a feat that had not yet been attempted by any band before. The only problem I even remotely had with the album was that it was recorded live. Live EDM does not really work as well as studio-recorded music, and these songs easily carry enough energy on their own to not need the crowd noise to energize the listener. However, I see a bright future with Young & Free due to its poppy sound and wide appeal among my age group.

This is where I will leave you now. I have turned from a person who would reject all Hillsong material to someone who has bought two of their albums and will be attending a concert of theirs at the end of August. I am cautiously optimistic for No Other Name, which releases today. I will be sure to post my thoughts on it in the next couple days.

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