My Own Little World

If I’m being honest, I really want the Christian film industry to succeed. I want it to be good art that families can feel comfortable seeing in a theater. I want it to have good messages for Christians in the world today, and I want these films to do well and gain respect outside of the American evangelical sphere. There haven’t been many films of this genre, though, that have risen above one of two categories – borderline sermon or borderline propaganda – and the typical lack of production quality behind these films means that I cannot in good conscience say they are good movies either. If I’m being honest, though, I also must admit that I Can Only Imagine is one of the better Christian films of the last several years. It does a surprisingly good job proving that its story – the life of Bart Millard and how his journey led him to write the titular song – can make an emotionally compelling film, which considering how unnecessary the film seems at its outset is quite a feat. ...

One of my friends called Reputation “fun trash,” and I’m beginning to agree with him. Taylor Swift’s sequel to her 80s-laden synthpop tribute 1989 – an album I thought was incredibly solid and more substantial than her previous work – has all the components of today’s latest trashy pop music. It has celebrity feuds, horrible break-ups, dubstep hooks fused with R&B rhythms – it’s all here. And I’m feeling somewhat…disappointed. Granted, being someone who loved the music of 1989 and its trendy nature makes it pretty plain that I don’t care for just any pop music. My favorite pop album of the year was Lorde’s Melodrama , a beautiful synthpop record with some indie flair that subverted the lyrical trends of most pop music by showing what happens after the party ends. Besides the musical quality of the record, what I loved most was that Lorde retained who she was – an outsider wanting to offer a slight critique of what the industry pushes as its product. Taylor Swift, ...

In 2004, a little band from Las Vegas called The Killers released their first album, Hot Fuss . It rocked the landscape of alternative music, with singles like "Mr. Brightside," "Somebody Told Me," and "All These Things That I've Done" still being played on alt rock stations to this day. That album very much feels like a complete collection of songs and not just like a few tracks slapped together into a record. The same can be said of that album's slightly lesser successor Sam's Town . As The Killers have continued their career, they have never really been able to replicate the coherence of their first two albums. For me, that's a really big deal: album flow is one of the things I look for the most in my music. Without a good flow, albums become haphazard and feel less polished to my ears and severely degrade in quality. Thankfully, guys, Wonderful Wonderful  is an album that feels like an album. The flow here is much, much smoother t...

John Mark McMillan is the most famous guy you've never heard of in Christian music. Since penning the modern classic "How He Loves," he has largely lived in the small-but-active indie sector of Christian music, working his way from alternative rock on his debut The Song inside the Sounds of Breaking Down  all the way to folk-tinged indie on his last effort Borderland . That last one made me fall in love with the man's writing style and his ability to weave seamlessly between complexity and simplicity while never losing lyrical meaning (if you want an example, go listen to "Future/Past"). Because of Borderland , I preordered Mercury & Lightning  in January. Yes, that's over seven months ago. I have been sitting on pins and needles ever since, waiting to hear how McMillan would continue his stellar career. From where he was on his last project, Mercury & Lightning  feels like a natural progression musically. McMillan continues on his Springst...

Kings Kaleidoscope is literally (in Chris Traeger's voice) the best thing that ever happened to my taste in music. They partially restored my faith in Christian music's ability to be good (not an easy thing to do for me). Their only two full-length albums have gotten perfect scores from me, and one of them is even in my top 5 albums of all time. Some people would argue I have a massive bias towards them and their music. To a point, I agree: I am biased towards Kings Kaleidoscope's material. Here's the thing, though: it's actually that good.  More so than almost any other artist in Christian music, they blend musical ingenuity with superb songwriting and lyricism. Their debut flipped the switch on a new generation of worship music, while their sophomore effort progressed their sound into a relatively sparser palette while also shifting their aim from worship music to music for the Christian life. Continuing their near-perfect catalog is their latest release, Th...

Over the past several years, I've really grown to love Hillsong United. Their 2013 and 2015 releases, Zion  and Empires , respectively, have made me regain hope for the worship music industry, proving that mainstream worship music can actually be well-written and musically conscious. That being said, I was really looking forward to whatever they did next and was surprised when they announced Wonder  less than a month ago for release this weekend. The title track was so ridiculously infectious that, despite some slightly vague lyrics, I couldn't help but put it on repeat as I waited for the other tracks to be released. I don't know if it was my wild anticipation or my high expectations, but Wonder  actually lacks a little bit of enchantment now that I've listened to it in its entirety a couple of times. United has done a great job over the past couple of years of carefully cultivating a specific sound for each of their releases, with Zion  being extremely energe...

In closing the door on 2016, I realize that there are a lot of films that I have seen that unfortunately I was unable to review for one reason or another. That doesn't mean, however, that I don't want you guys to know what I think of most of these films, so just like the last couple of years I will be doing a few posts over the next month or so wrapping up all of the films I got a chance to see from this past year. This time, I've got Emma Watson, some birds with hot tempers, and musical Irish boys for you... Colonia  - Skip it.  Quite bland. Emma Watson is decent as usual, and Daniel Bruhl does a pretty good job too. However, they're not able to really do that much with their characters because of a poorly written script and a lot of cliched moments. The filmmaking isn't terrible, as the pace works quite well, but on the whole there's a lot more justice that could have been done to make this interesting topic an interesting movie. Grade: 39   The Angr...

A couple years ago, I got hit with this infectious bug from this song called "My Type." It had a ton of soul, swagger, and just made me want to dance. The band behind this infectious indie pop gem goes by the name of Saint Motel, and as I dove into their discography, I began to see that "My Type" wasn't just a one-trick pony: they had a ton more in their catalog to enjoy. Their debut full-length from 2012, Voyeur , had that same indie party pop vibe that I enjoyed so much from "My Type" while also showing a little bit of an expanded palette at times. It wasn't perfect, but it was incredibly enjoyable. Fast forward to today. I've been waiting for a new release from Saint Motel ever since I finished listening to their back catalog, and this Friday saintmotelevision  is getting released to the world. But does it live up to the hype, and will it please people like me who fell head over heels in love with their older work? The answer to both o...

A few months ago, a British worship artist by the name of Ian Yates got in contact with me, asking me to review his upcoming album. I jumped at the chance to get a bit of an early look at a (at least in the United States) relatively unknown artist while also getting to form a bit of a relationship directly with people actually making their own music. I went and listened to all of Ian's back catalog to make sure I had a proper perspective on this new album. To be honest, I'm not really a huge fan of a whole lot of his older stuff, as it fits into the modern worship box way too snugly. There was definitely some evident improvement as I went from album to album, but on the whole it's by the books worship music. I didn't think his material was bad; it just didn't grab me in any meaningful way. That being said, Ian's new project Awaken to Love  has a lot more to offer than his prior work. It's got some solid lyricism and musical composition that are just in...

At this point in Skillet's career, most people know what to expect from these Christian hard rockers. Whenever they make an album, no matter what the explicit theme is, there will be some super emo power ballads, riff-centric upbeat harder tracks, and some symphonic strings in the background. Ever since their hit album Comatose , this is the formula they've followed and have done commercially quite well with. Most people either really relate to their music or find it derivative of itself and quite bland. I'm definitely in the latter of the two camps. I really enjoyed their 2003 release Collide  because of its rabid sonic intensity and somewhat rough-around-the-edges sound. Comatose  was slightly less enjoyable for me because of its extra layer of polish, but it still retained some originality with its addition of strings and some subtle electronic elements. However, with Awake , Skillet lost me. Their over-reliance on either ballads or remakes of "Comatose" we...

House of Heroes always has a knack for making albums that are very listenable. I began listening to the band several years ago and instantly was caught up in their album Suburba  and its catchy post-grunge rock. There was a little more pop than I preferred, but for that record it really worked. I didn't really move on from Suburba  and haven't listened to them much since then, but I do have some fond memories of driving home from work on country roads and just blaring that record. Fast forward to today, and House of Heroes is releasing their latest effort and first "official" concept album, Colors . A completely fan-funded record (that I got the privilege to support a couple of years ago), this is a new chapter for the band's evolution, both musically and lyrically. That being said, musically this effort is not always far off from the classic "House of Heroes sound" that fans have come to know and love. Lead single "Colors Run" as well as...

Kings Kaleidoscope is one of the rare bands in Christian music that isn't afraid to do whatever they want. Looking at their discography makes this plainly obvious. In addition to recording church-focused worship music (most of it from their days at Mars Hill Church in Seattle), they have also created what I cite as one of the most game-changing albums in all of Christian music, their full-length debut Becoming Who We Are . It combined the sonic complexities of the incredibly dense indie rock created by bands like Broken Social Scene, The Polyphonic Spree, and Arcade Fire with incredibly poignant, heartfelt, vertical lyrics. Here's the question, though: how do you follow that absolutely perfect, widely acclaimed monstrosity? Well, in Beyond Control , Kings Kaleidoscope has given us the answer, and I don't know if it's the one that everyone (especially me) was expecting. You see, one of the things I loved about Becoming Who We Are  is its sonic density and complex...

Whenever a lead vocalist of a band I love releases a solo side project, the results are always very interesting. Jon Foreman of Switchfoot has released a lot of solo material recently that is so different from what Switchfoot does as a band, yet it still works incredibly well. On the other hand, you have other people like Dustin Kensrue of Thrice who remain mostly unchanged in their solo material. In other words, it's interesting to see where the visible heart and soul of a band goes in its spare time. Enter Zach Bolen, frontman of the band Citizens & Saints. After two studio releases of indie rock with a worship slant, he's ready to release this set of nine tracks to the world after 12 years of writing and polishing. The question is, how did it turn out? Honestly, this is one of the coolest sounding albums I've heard all year. 1001  is definitely a departure from the more electronically-tinged work that Bolen did with Citizens & Saints, and it's also ...

Over the past several years, music has been undergoing a return to roots at the same time as it has been going forward. Folk music is back in the limelight, with groups like Mumford and Sons and solo artists like Vance Joy and Sufjan Stevens providing a renaissance of sorts to the genre. Of course, besides the countless radio singles Mumford has brought to the table, The Lumineers are probably the best-known group in this new folk revival, with their smash hit "Ho Hey" from their debut self-titled album. However, recently a question has arisen within this group of artists: where do we go from here? Many of these bands it seems have two choices: stay the same or go to a different genre. Some listeners are having a little bit of folk fatigue, it seems, so artists are being forced to consider which direction they should go. Now, The Lumineers' first album was a little bit of fresh air even within its own genre because of its incredibly bare-bones recording techniques...

Some of you might be wondering what I'm doing reviewing a Passion album. In some of my previous posts, I've pointed out that I am not a fan of live worship albums, and that's all that Passion does. Granted, they do it better than almost anyone on an annual basis, but their releases are generally pretty similar year to year. If you've heard one, you've heard them all. Apparently, not anymore. When they released this online on January 1, I thought to myself, "That's weird: Passion 2016 hasn't even happened yet. There's no way they have a live album ready yet." Well, that's because it's not live: this album is completely recorded in a studio. I'm a little surprised I didn't hear more about this when Salvation's Tide Is Rising  dropped. This was a potential game-changer here. The last of the three major worship music camps (the other two are Bethel and Hillsong, by the way) to have not released a studio album is finall...

I'm back once again with another Christmas album for you all. This week is something a lot more contemporary than Bing Crosby's White Christmas  and is a good choice for you indie music lovers: The Modern Post's Lowborn King . I first heard of The Modern Post after getting familiar with Thrice frontman Dustin Kensrue's solo projects. I discovered this side project of his through some fellow Christian indie music fans, and gave their EP Grace Alone  a spin about a year ago. I was completely wowed with both the sound and the lyrics, as it gave the EP a very aggressive reverence.  So when it came to looking for Christmas music this year, Lowborn King  was near the top of my list of what I wanted to explore. It's quite safe to say that The Modern Post doesn't disappoint here either, evolving their sound ever so slightly while still bringing that same aggressive reverence that I loved on Grace Alone .  Lowborn King  is another  EP, which I hav...

I deeply dreaded this moment. Every single streaming service so far had failed me. Spotify was too focused on playlists, Google's option just didn't quite work, and Tidal was too unstable as a business. I was going to try Rdio next, but they just got bought by Pandora and are going to be shut down, so they were out. And Deezer isn't available in the United States yet, so that was also out. That left pretty much one option. The one that I swore I would never try. The one from one of my least favorite companies in the world. If you guessed Apple Music , you're right. And if you missed that in the title of this post...well, I don't know what to tell you. I really have never been a fan of Apple as a company, ditching every part of their company except for their music store over a year ago. I didn't like using iTunes with such a large music library, and as for iOS...well, that's a completely different (and much longer) explanation. Yet, when moving over...

I'm in the middle of what's probably my third listen of A Head Full of Dreams , and I cannot decide for the life of me whether I like this record or not. On one hand, this is the upbeat Coldplay that I know and (usually) love back once again with a vengeance to inspire the world to seize the day and make the most of their lives. On the other hand, this is overall the least Coldplay has ever sounded like themselves because of the increasing amount of electronic textures present. Granted, A Head Full of Dreams  pushes Chris Martin and Co. into new directions musically. When I head "Viva la Vida" back in 2008, I never would have thought that we would be hearing Coldplay going full-on disco pop ("Adventure of a Lifetime") or R&B ("Hymn for the Weekend," which also features Beyonce). These areas of experimentation are intriguing and typically work because they're so unexpected. From a band who over the years has been known to more or less st...

Thanksgiving has come and gone, and that means it's time for Christmas music. Over the weeks leading up to Christmas, I'll be doing a series of reviews on as many of the Christmas albums I have as I can. This week, we'll kick things off with an eternal classic: Bing Crosby's White Christmas . I'll bet that when most of you think of Christmas music, one of the first songs to come to mind after the classic Christ-centered carols is "White Christmas." I'll also bet that the version your mind jumps to is that by Bing Crosby. What most casual listeners don't realize, however, is that Crosby was much more than a one- or two-trick pony. His rich, soothing voice continues to this day to be a great match for these classic Christmas tracks we see on White Christmas . Take the opening track of "Silent Night." Nearly every single full-length Christmas album has some sort of rendition of it, and for good reason. However, Crosby's smooth b...

I'm back at trying out music streaming services after auditioning both Spotify and Google Play Music. I didn't care for Spotify at all , and Google Play Music, while better,  still had its own issues . I moved onto what seemed like the next best option: Jay-Z's service, Tidal. Tidal relaunched itself this past March with Jay-Z and a slew of other artists (including some personal favorites like Coldplay and Arcade Fire, as well as Beyonce, Nicki Minaj, Daft Punk, and others) touting themselves as co-owners. They all signed a declaration at the launch event that basically said Tidal would revolutionize music streaming as we know it. Here's the problem: it didn't. Tidal didn't catch on with the general public and is generally regarded as a business failure. They're on their third CEO since their relaunch and have failed to attract any kind of significant subscriber base. This really sucks, especially considering that I love the way Tidal works. I love t...