When accessibility becomes trite

Avoiding cliches like the…

Communicating in a fresh and vivid manner Part 2
3rd October 2008

In the last blog, we were considering the role of creativity in worship and how finding new and vivid ways of expressing unchanging truth can help people engage with those truths in a fresh way. Meanwhile, I'd asked the usually mild-mannered Dave Currie to conjure up one of his wonderful reviews of a CD I knew we were both keenly anticipating - Chris Tomlin's latest offering, Hello Love. Here are Dave's thoughts...

Being as technologically challenged and lacking in dexterity as me can lead you to some interesting places on your iPod. I recently found myself accidentally in the “genres” menu (again) and noticed that those right-on types at Apple have recently changed how they describe worship music from “gospel / religious” to “inspirational”.

Which isn’t as bad as it first sounds. One thing worship music should certainly do is inspire us - “to seek God’s face” as Louie Giglio, Chris Tomlin’s long-time mentor and friend puts it. Inspirational is exactly how I would describe his ability to combine accessible, God-centred lyrics with immediately engaging music. I am not alone in this view; he has won multiple awards and is the American church’s most sung writer, yet he remains grounded in his mission to see God glorified. Against this backdrop, his new album “Hello Love” is one of the most eagerly anticipated worship albums of recent years.

From the off, it’s clear that the consensus in the Tomlin camp is, “it isn’t broken, we’ll therefore not fix it”, so we get the usual mixture of up-tempo, guitar-driven pop-rock and more reflective ballads. And when I say the usual, I mean even the track sequencing is uncannily similar to 2006’s “See the Morning”. In spite of this, there is something quite obviously different from the first listen – this is a much less consistently engaging album, both musically and lyrically. Put simply, the writing is not as complete and the melodies are not as strong. Attempts have been made to paper over these cracks with Disney-slick production, strings and choirs, but to little effect. Lyrically, there is a tendency to push accessibility towards triteness; for example, verse 1 of “Sing, Sing, Sing” opens with, “What’s not to love about [Jesus]?” True, of course, but does it really inspire us, engage us at a heart, soul and mind level?

There are a few highpoints amongst the disappointment. Ironically, these are the tracks with less gloss such as “I Will Rise”, “All the Way My Saviour Leads Me” and a cover of Bluetree’s excellent “God of This City”.

A cynic might say that the ubiquity of Chris Tomlin’s songs meant that saturation was inevitable, but I disagree. I’ve recently been listening again to his back catalogue, and it continues to inspire and point unambiguously to the wonder of God’s nature and works. “Hello Love” does so too, but less convincingly and much less consistently.

Dave Currie