Jeremy's World

Both of you who read my blog know that I play drums in my church worship team.  I enjoy it and sometimes sing (though I drum better than I sing which isn’t saying much).  I was recently made aware of some feedback on our music.

"The band is really great.  But all you do are songs written in the 90′s."

Certainly that can’t be true, right?  It’s not really true.  We do a lot of Chris Tomlin, Tim Hughes, etc. stuff written in the early 2000′s.  But I guess because it’s done so much it just feels old?  Well, and of course those are mixed in with the "Trading My Sorrows" and "Better is One Day" classics.

So last night I stayed up scouring for good worship music written within the last couple of years.  That proved to be a bit of a waste of time.  See, there is a big difference in "good Christian music" and "good worship music."  So much of what I found (and listen to) like Casting Crowns, Jeremy Camp, Building 429, Kutless, etc. have some really great songs.  But, they just aren’t worship songs.  Performance?  Yes.  Worship?  No.

Sadly it seems that good worship music generally has repetitive sections and few, repeated phrases so that they are "easy" to sing.  A lot of Hillsong, Matt Redman and other "usuals" are exactly that.  So what is a worship team looking for something fresh, new and contemporary to do?

Interestingly, nobody seems to have a good answer.  There are a few gems that will come out (and as mentioned above, "all in the 90′s" is an exaggeration) but for the most part, churches who actually report to CCLI on what they are using in church are doing "the usuals."  (No, the irony of me swiping the CCLI logo from their website without express, written consent is not lost on me)

The February top 25:

1. How Great Is Our God
2. Blessed Be Your Name
3. Here I Am To Worship
4. Open The Eyes Of My Hear…
5. Shout To The Lord
6. Holy Is The Lord
7. You Are My King
8. Forever
9. Lord I Lift Your Name On…
10. Come Now Is The Time To …
11. God Of Wonders
12. Everlasting God
13. You Are My All In All
14. We Fall Down
15. The Heart Of Worship
16. You’re Worthy Of My Praise
17. Breathe
18. Trading My Sorrows
19. Beautiful One
20. In Christ Alone
21. I Give You My Heart
22. Days Of Elijah
23. Friend Of God
24. Better Is One Day
25. Above All

Yep.  "The usuals." (and I’m too lazy to link them all for your listening pleasure)

That said, Jennifer’s insight last night was, "Yeah, we’re used to them, but that’s part of what makes them good worship songs.  I want to be able to close my eyes and know the words or be able to catch on the words after one or two times through."

Is familiarity the enemy of creativity?  Or, is it simply a matter of preference?