Good Talks|May 07, 2014 08:18 EDT By Justin Sarachik
Worship singer and band leader Michael Gungor wrote a blog a number of years ago where he expressed his thoughts on the Christian music industry, and shared he felt most of the music was "disingenuous" and made with "false emotion." Since that time he has written a follow-up explaining some of his thoughts further, but that still does not mean most of what he originally said was wrong or not thought-provoking.
"I find something very disingenuous about most Christian music. This is something I can simply feel at a gut level. If I hear a song, and I hear any sort of pretending or false emotion, that's a good first indicator," he wrote in a blog post. "Christian music often has a sheen to it that other music doesn't have. Some pop and country music has a similar sheen, but the Christian sheen is like a blander sheen somehow."
Gungor explained that while on tour he and his bandmates play a game where they listen to short snippets of songs. They then have to guess whether it is Christian or secular. The singer can often tell which is which because of the "false emotion" he tends to hear in the vocals before they even speak of Jesus. He also said, the mix of the music is especially high on the vocals because for this genre the message is important.
"The false emotion that I'm talking about might be familiar to some of you. There's just something more believable about the whispery sexy voice that is singing about sex on the mainstream radio station than the voice that copies that style of singing while putting lyrics in about being in the arms of Jesus. And it's really not even the style or the lyric that is the problem to me, it's the fact that I don't believe that the singer is feeling the kind of emotions in singing that lyric that would lead to that style of singing," he said regarding the lack of being genuine in Christian music.
Gungor brings home a point when talking about Christian music and its multiple genres. He feels a lot of Christian music wants to reach different audiences so they cater to their sound to reach those people, however, because of that the music is not genuine. For example, if a regular Christian band wants to reach punk rock kids, they make punk rock that is positive and removes all of the rebelliousness and anger. So then with the angst removed, is that truly punk rock, or is it Jesus thrown over a punk rock shell?
"It's the soul of that music, whether that soul is good or evil is not the point, simply that it is the soul. So when you remove the soul from music and transplant the body parts (chord changes, instrumentation, dress, lights, and everything but the soul...) and parade it around with some more "positive" lyrics posing as Christian music, then what you have is a musical zombie," he continued.
Read the full blog post here.
From this point on out in the article, Gungor speaks about Christian music fans, and artists losing their creativity because they box themselves in trying to cater to certain Christian groups. He drives home the point that while it is great to glorify God, God should be praised in the manner of which he deserves, not with a fake song, but one from the heart. He also clarifies that not all music and musicians are like that, but is just speaking from experience on his own realizations.
Read his follow-up blog post here.
This type of thinking is similar among other artists in the industry. In an interview with the Christian Post, drummer of the Newsboys Duncan Phillips explained the band's thought process on making their new album.
"We really wanted to go outside of our box because I think ... we kind of felt that Christian music is really the only type of music that is sort of gauged on its lyrical content rather than the art of the music. This is fine, but unfortunately the downside is I think music is kind of second fiddle for the lyrics - I really believe that the art itself has suffered. It's second rank, and that's one of the complaints we hear from a lot of people. The music art just isn't there, and I would have to agree with them about that," he said.
Phillips understands the power and opportunity in music to use its message to draw people in to its life changing words. "A lot of the time the art of the music is such a powerful force that it can actually bypass the conscience. Through the medium of music God does wonderful and mighty things and I really believe God has done that in the past."
What do you think of Gungor and Phillips' thoughts on Christian music? Is it hard to connect because of the "copy-cat" nature of the different genres, or do you believe it all depends on the heart of someone? Sound off in the comments.
