Christian rock is a genre of rock music that features lyrics focusing on matters of Christian faith, often with an emphasis on Jesus. The extent to which their lyrics are explicitly Christian varies between bands. Many bands who perform Christian rock have ties to the contemporary Christian music labels, media outlets, and festivals, while other bands are independent.
In the 1990s and 2000s, Tooth & Nail Records became a catalyst in legitimizing Christian rock as a notable subgenre of alternative rock. Signing acts like Starflyer 59 and MxPx, Tooth & Nail helped make alternative rock immediately accessible within evangelical church communities throughout the United States, and subsequently the wider Western world with the advent of music streaming.
In the 2000s and onwards, Christian rock bands Kutless, Red, Skillet, and Thousand Foot Krutch along with VS Reforged were influenced by acts like Linkin Park to develop their own sounds that combined hard rock and nu metal.https://www.jesusfreakhideout.com/interviews/Kutless.asp Skillet received Grammy nominations for two albums,CCMMagazine.com: Skillet Closes Out 2007 With Grammy Nomination . Retrieved March 13, 2008. along with having two albums certified platinum and double platinum. Red also received Grammy nominations for two albums.
History Christian response to early rock music (1950s–1960s) Most traditional and fundamentalist Christians did not view rock music favorably when it became popular with young people from the 1950s, even though country and gospel music often influenced early rock music. In 1952, Archibald Davison, a Harvard professor, summed up the sound of traditional Christian music and why its supporters might not like rock music when he wrote of "... a rhythm that avoids strong pulses; a melody whose physiognomy is neither so characteristic nor so engaging as to make an appeal in its own behalf; counterpoint, which cultivates long-breathed eloquence rather than instant and dramatic effect; a chromaticism which is at all times restricted in amount and lacking in emotionalism; and modality which creates an atmosphere unmistakably ecclesiastical".Faulkner, Q. 2006, "Straight Talk About Traditional Versus Contemporary Christian Music", The American Organist, vol. 40, no. 6, pp. 79–81. In the light of Archibald Davison's characterisation it is easy to see how different these two genres of music are. Christians in the United States did not want their children exposed to music with unruly, impassioned vocals, loud guitar-riffs and jarring, hypnotic rhythms. Rock and roll differed from the norm, and thus it was seen by them as a threat. Often the music was overtly sexual in nature, as in the case of Elvis Presley, who became controversial and massively popular partly for his suggestive stage antics and dancing. However, "Elvis" was a religious person who released a gospel album: Peace in the Valley in 1957. Individual Christians may have listened to or even performed rock music in many cases, but conservative church establishments - particularly in the American South - regarded it as anathema.
He Touched Me, a 1972 gospel-music album by Elvis Presley, sold over 1 million copies in the US alone and earned Presley his second of three Grammy Awards. Not counting compilations, it was his third and final album devoted exclusively to gospel music. The song "He Touched Me" was written in 1963 by Bill Gaither, an American singer and songwriter of southern gospel and Contemporary Christian music.
In the 1960s, rock music developed artistically, attained worldwide popularity and became associated with the radical counterculture, firmly alienating many Christians. In 1966 The Beatles, one of the most popular and influential rock-bands of their era, ran into trouble with many of their American fans when John Lennon jokingly offered his opinion that Christianity was dying and that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus now". The romantic, melodic rock songs of the band's early career had formerly been viewed as relatively inoffensive by Christians, but after the remark, churches nationwide organized Beatles-record burnings and Lennon was forced to apologize. Subsequently, the Beatles and most rock musicians experimented with a more complex, psychedelic style of music that frequently used anti-establishment, drug-related, or sexual lyrics, while The Rolling Stones sang "Sympathy for the Devil" (1968), a song openly written from the point of view of Satan. Allegations of Satanic intent also arose from the Beatles and others of the controversial backmasking recording-technique. This further increased Christian opposition to rock music.
Later, in the 1960s, the escalating Vietnam War, Civil Rights Movement, Paris student riots of 1968 and other events served as catalysts for youth activism and political withdrawal or protest, which became associated with rock bands, whether or not they were openly political. Moreover, many saw the music as promoting a lifestyle of promiscuous "sex, drugs and rock and roll", also reflected in the behavior of many rock stars. However, there was growing recognition of the diverse musical and ideological potential of rock. Countless new bands sprang up in the mid-to-late 1960s, as rock displaced older, smoother pop styles to become the dominant form of pop music, a position it would enjoy almost continuously until the end of the 20th century.
Development (mid 1960s–1980s)
Among the first bands that played Christian rock was the Crusaders, a Southern Californian garage rock band, whose November 1966 Tower Records album Make a Joyful Noise with Drums and Guitars is considered one of the first gospel rock releases;David Di Sabatino, in Mark Allan Powell, Encyclopedia of Contemporary Christian Music (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002):217. John Joseph Thompson identifies it as "the first record of Christian rock". Brian Collins characterises Mind Garage as "arguably the first band of its kind":Brian Collins, Sightings, Martin Marty Center University of Chicago Divinity School, Compare: Bluefield Daily Telegraph (April 24, 2009), they recorded the 1967 Electric Liturgy at RCA's "Nashville Sound" studio in 1969.Jo Renee Formicola, The Politics of Values: Games Political Strategists Play (Rowman & Littlefield 2008):64. Formicola argues that "Christian Rock Music began...when a group known as the Mind Garage recorded "Electric Liturgy". Both of these recordings were preceded by the rockabilly praise LP I Like God's Style, written and performed by one 16-year-old Isabel Baker and released on the private Wichita, Kansas Romco label in 1965, which no one published on until the 2000s.Anthony Martinez, "June 18–19, 1965: Isabel Baker Recorded 'I Like God's Style'" Classic Christian Rock (June 18, 2017)
Larry Norman, often described as the "father of Christian rock",Sanford, David. "Farewell, Larry Norman." Christianity Today. June 27, 2005. Retrieved December 26, 2007. "The man known as the Father of Christian Rock, whose health has been failing in recent years, played his last U.S. concert Friday night in his hometown of Salem, Oregon." and in his later years "the Grandfather of Christian rock",Mike Adkins, "Contemporary Christian Music: The Real Deal in Quallity & Passion" (January 3, 2010). who, in 1969 recorded and released Upon This Rock, "the first commercially released Jesus rock album",Don Cusic, The Sound of Light: A History of Gospel Music (Popular Press, 1990):127. See also John J. Thompson, Raised by Wolves: The Story of Christian Rock & Roll (ECW Press, 2000):49. challenged a view held by some conservative Christians (predominantly fundamentalists) that rock music was anti-Christian. One of his songs, "Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?" summarized his attitude and his quest to pioneer Christian rock music. A cover version of Larry Norman's Rapture-themed "I Wish We'd All Been Ready" appears in the Evangelical Christian feature film A Thief in the Night and appeared on Cliff Richard's Christian album Small Corners along with "Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?".
In 1966, the band Žeteoci (transl. The Harvesters) was formed in Yugoslavia. Founded by four students of the Zagreb Catholic Faculty of Theology, Žeteoci performed beat music with religious lyrics, being the first Christian rock band in Yugoslavia and arguably the first Christian rock band in a communist country. Although an openly religious band in a communist state, due to specific political and cultural milieu of the Non-Aligned Yugoslavia, for the most of their career Žeteoci enjoyed the attention of the media and notable popularity among the Yugoslav youth. The band also played a pioneering role on the Yugoslav rock scene in general, as their first and only album, To nije tajna (It Is Not a Secret), released in 1969, was the second full-length album in the history of Yugoslav rock music. They ended their activity in 1971, as the members of the band completed their studies of theology and went on to become priests of the Catholic Church.
Another Christian rock pioneer, Randy Stonehill, released his first album in 1971, the Larry Norman-produced Born Twice.While it is claimed that Norman borrowed $3,000 from Pat Boone to start One Way Records (see Randy Stonehill in Chris Willman, "RANDY STONEHILL: TURNING TWENTY", CCM, August 1990), Norman denied this explicitly. (See Larry Norman, linear notes, Bootleg (2005 CDR Release-"Red Letter Edition"):2. In the most common pressing of the album, side one is entirely a live performance. Another early Christian rock album was Mylon (We Believe) by Mylon LeFevre, son of members of the southern gospel group The LeFevres. He recorded the album with members of Classics IV and released it through Cotillion Records in 1970. Ocean (Canada) gained gospel pop big hit "Put Your Hand in the Hand" in 1971. Norman Greenbaum and the Doobie Brothers had gospel hits, but they were not Christian rockers. Sister Janet Mead had a gospel hit in 1974.
In the late 1970s, Christian rock received exposure through more mainstream rock and folk rock musicians. Bob Dylan became a born-again Christian and released three albums between 1979 and 1981. This period would yield the Grammy winning single "Gotta Serve Somebody" and three successful concert tours that would later see release as The Bootleg Series Vol. 13. Dylan's influence was also felt in other members of the folk revival; Arlo Guthrie, for example, converted in 1979 (in part over his concerns over whether he faced a Huntington's disease diagnosis like others in his family) and released his own Christian folk-rock album Outlasting the Blues; Outlasting the Blues received the biggest record label promotion of Guthrie's career.