Shaun Groves
From my seat near the bottom of the Christian Music food chain, I’m witnessing what I can only describe as a swelling rebellion by those in the Christina Music industry against one another – especially against radio and retail. Artists, being inherently self-absorbed and whiny, lacking self-control and a volume knob, and the hardest hit financially when things don’t go their way, are the loudest and most venomous voices of the rebellion at the moment. I have not talked with an artist in the last year who is pleased with the current state of affairs in the industry and who doesn’t in some way blame radio for its woes. The artists are culled from all the major labels and a couple independents and their opinions range from livid or disinterested to saddened and leaving.
But radio isn’t the only face on the dart board. Artists, both successful and not, are increasingly engaged in the bashing of other artists seen as less than their ideal, of labels and radio stations seen as out to make money first and represent their Jesus second, and of retailers for screening CDs for the word “whore” while not applying the same this-might-offend filter to t-shirts and books because those products, unlike CDs, are sold with a return policy.
But artists aren’t the only one’s raising their voices and shaking their fists. Labels are angry at radio stations for not helping them sell records, and lots of them, better than they do. Radio stations, wielding most of the industry’s power at the moment, are pissed off at ungrateful labels and artists for complaining at all while station ratings and revenues continue to increase. Retailers are pissed off at artists for selling their wares on-line and at labels for selling them on iTunes and at radio stations for not playing more artists, which would help them sell more CDs.
Can’t we just get along?
Not right now. There seems to be some good coming from this tension. And so this fighting may be a necessary evil used to move us towards understanding and a better representation of Christ together. The animosity has gone on long enough in some of us that it has fizzled and turned into self-examination and a craving for peace.
The hold up to peace at the moment, in my opinion, might not be our differences, but instead what we have in common: a desire to be successful that at times outweighs our desire to be faithful. And the inability to pursue faithfulness at the possible expense of personal financial success.
So for my part in making in peace I’ll begin by confessing. I was mad at everyone, all of you, fans included, for more than a year – a wasted year I can’t get back. And my hostility made me say and do things I deeply regret today.
And I’m moving to step two of peace-making by entertaining all points of view, asking all parties what they want, what they’re mad about, why they do what they do and why they think the rest of us should do what we do. That’s a good place to start: listening, believing no side is all good or all bad (especially my own), believing everyone can teach me something. And they are.
There are many voices to hear in the rebellion at the moment. Many confident and brave people daring to say publicly what they are feeling and thinking about the strange mixing of commerce and faith. I’ll post links to them when I find them. Let’s listen together with a teachable mind, willing to appraise all points of view and judge ourselves first in light of them. Maybe with enough listening and self-examination we can stop being pissed and start getting better.
Here’s the first of many voices I hope to bring to SHLOG.COM’s many industry ears. This is not an endorsement of any point of view. If you work in the industry and have a different viewpoint, feel free to blog it or e-mail it for the rest of to hear. I promise to listen.
Peace,
Shaun
kpita says:
I’ve just posted some thoughts on the “Christian” music industry at http://www.colossiansthreesixteen.blogspot.com and I’d love feedback.
Thanks;
Brent
Andrew Osenga says:
Wow, Shaun posted over on my site to tell me about this conversation, and I had to come over and see it. It’s encouraging to see this kind of discussion about this topic.
I feel like I may have been a bit misunderstood by some of the posters on here, though, and want to answer those comments.
My post was not really intended to be a “Christian music sucks” rant. I’ve felt that way at times for sure, and have made that rant many times as well, but, for the most part, I’m learning to leave that kind of thinking about it behind.
The nature of my post was to point out my own sin, honestly. The truth is that most of the music that is popular to the general Christian audience doesn’t really say anything to me, or is often downright offensive to me, whether in its quality, theology, or lacks thereof. What really troubled me was how, when money got a little tight I was going to try to contribute to it just for money, and might have written things I knew I didn’t believe. That was very wrong of me.
However, I wasn’t pointing fingers at other artists, at least directly, nor saying that I think I don’t get what I deserve. The Lord has provided faithfully for my family through me playing music, and I would never say that I deserved even that.
I have been on both sides of the success coin in Christian music, in a band called the Normals that sold about seven albums, and in Caedmon’s Call, which has sold a lot more than that. The dilemma and conversations were the same in both bands. What we hear on the radio doesn’t reflect what we believe. That’s the real problem, and because money can ride on our acting like we believe it or not, things can get even hairier.
I want to make sure that my confession didn’t come across as whining. God has called me to make music, and the longer I do it, the more I doubt my calling is so specifically to the church. They sure haven’t felt too called to buy it!! Sorry, couldn’t resist. Anyway, I appreciate this discussion and it is my sincere hope that artists who are believers will create, whether for commercial consumption or not, music that is honoring to the truth and magnificence of the Glory of God. Guys like Shaun and me who talk about this stuff aren’t trying to say we’re the best and everyone is beneath us, just that we are aware that not everyone is approaching their art with an honesty and purpose that line up with the Gospel. It is our desire to spur more people onto that.
But we are pretty darn good.
Thanks for reading this.
Mediocre Label says:
I have been keeping tabs on this and its a slow day in the record label so I am jumping in. While I have a lot to say about the art thing, I am going to take it as is on this blog and go from there. Also, I am going to throw in a business perspective that doesn’t totally match up to my actual opinion but is a valid perspective nonetheless.
Working for a “big producer of mediocrity” as we in nashville are so-called, is an experience all to itself. You daily walk a fine-line of needing to make money but wanting to support your artists.
Alot of business decisions are made to keep our long-term bad music making friends around because even their bad albums sell more than a great singer/songwriter/artist. You hope to have enough “pop” to support the “art” and that my friends is a difficult thing to do in Christian music because if you spend a lot on an artist who fails, you have a substantially smaller margin for error and you don’t have a Madonna(or insert long-running, big-money generating artist here) to carry you through that loss.
Radio certainly shields themselves from fault via testing but ultimately their “ministry” comes down to selling advertising or “finding partners” as our non-commercial station friends like to call it. They play the songs that get the best response and get people to give or get people to listen. Jack-FM is the most popular format of station that is sweeping across the US. Jack pretends to play what songs they want, but really they play the highest rated radio songs of all time and people like that.
Call it art or call it pop. Sometimes we should just call it entertainment, and people pay for that.
Shaun, your comments about what people like and dislike across a generational line certainly affect what radio plays. Ultimately, christian radio is satisfying an older female audience who were teens when pearl jam was big and they are now in their 30’s and like the baritone rocker in what we others hate. Thus the success of Camp, Casting Crowns, Building 429 and others.
Anonymous says:
HA! I was looking for the opportunity for you all to catch your breath so this slower mind and slower typist could slip into the conversation.
Brant and WAY employee, this 30-something year old white female who’s not quite Becky is enjoying and learning from your posts SO much. Thank you.
Radio IS stinking hard, when you want to do it well. And I can tell that’s where your hearts are.
I think the best element in Christian radio these days is what occurs during the breaks between songs…between promos and sweepers and commercials.
Listening to air checks at GMA this year, I felt so encouraged by what I was hearing…lots of examples of air folks genuinely connecting with and ministering to listeners. GOOD RADIO.
I do what I joke is the world’s second smallest Christian radio show. It WAS the smallest until a listener decided he wanted to start his own show so we got him trained and spun him off a few months ago.
The show I do is just once a week, on a secular, nonprofit, free-form station in the Washington DC suburbs and online. The station operates very much like an NPR affiliate. I am very aware that in radio, I am the least of the brethren. I’ve gotten brushed aside more than once at GMA when someone figured out that I didn’t earn my living on the air. That’s ok though. There were plenty of other nice people there.
I started my little show because I spent my teenage years listening to a show in the Philadelphia market that I have spent my adult years missing. And I know it’s something that couldn’t exist today on a Christian radio station. The jock back then (no ‘air personalities’ in those days!) was given the freedom to play what he wanted, and he used that opportunity to choose the music each day based on what he understood God to be directing him to share about with his listeners. He knew those listeners not by what a consultant told him about them, but by interacting with them as often as he could. And like that good radio that I heard at GMA and that you do, he was free to talk and to pray. And he was free to bring listeners into the station to talk about what God was doing in their lives.
Sometimes, I was that listener in the studio with him. And my time learning from my friend, who was sensitive to the Spirit, knew his audience and had the freedom to select the latest single or that third cut on an old album to minister to his audience, was one of the biggest influences in my young Christian life.
When I was away at college, emulating his show on my school station, my friend’s station changed hands, and you know too well what happens to air folk when a station is sold and the format is tweaked. When he left, that moment in Philadelphia radio left with him. I never found that anywhere else, so after all these years I decided to try it myself. And praise God, the listener feedback from around the country has been positive, even though a lot of the music and topics I choose are not.
I’d like to figure out a way to try to grow what I’m doing if it would please God. But I’m not aiming for a fulltime career at a station. I know what you guys deal with—the instability, the way too low pay, the time and creativity it takes to prep a daily show properly. I respect what you do and I admire you for caring enough to do it well. I wish you career on-air folks had more freedom to choose your music though; you’d probably choose stuff that would make me and a huge potential listenership out on the fringes of the Christian subculture tune in to Christian radio more. But I guess as long as Christian radio and as long as artists too are tied to the market and to consultants, there isn’t real freedom for either of you—not the kind that Brant’s musicmaking web designer and mailmen friends have to create and communicate without having to please anyone but God and the people they’re playing for.
I’m interested in your question Brant, of what somebody would do–Shaun, Brian, anybody–if they had their own station or at least their own show. For those reading this who have a radio show now, how would what you do be different if you were free from station brass and imaging, from advertisers, from donors and underwriters, and from consultants? What are your experience, your listeners, your gut and the Spirit telling you? Please teach me. I am so eager to learn from you all.
nancy
WAY Employee says:
Ooops, apparently the numbering got off, because now this post is #50.
Shaun,
Sorry about the pointless comment right here. I just had to be 50…
WAY Employee says:
^Amen.
(yes… comment #48… if I time it right and someone comments below me, maybe I can be #50. A lifelong goal of mine!)
WAY Employee says:
Nope… not offended. You can bash on all the artists if you want… I just more or less wanted to put out a word for my buddy’s in Barlow Girl.
I am looking forward to a whole front page entry on your positive/upbeat thoughts. I think I’m starting to really see where you’re going with this.
Oh, and I forgot I was going to say one other thing earlier (I swear, I’m an undiagnosed ADD case); it does always help when you know an artist (or employees at a radio station). I probably would’ve enjoyed White Flag anyway, but I know I like it more and am paying it much more attention because I’m a Shlogger and I feel more connected to you because of it.
I’m not sure I had a point there. Ooooh, look, shiny objects… gotta go.
WAY Employee says:
Wow, I get busy for a day and miss out on all the conversation. I’m enjoying it.
First to Andrew Osenga… There had to be more than 7 Normals albums sold. Me and 6 of my friends all bought it! Oh wait… hmmm… Seriously though, I loved all the Normals albums, especially the last one that wasn’t, dare I say, as radio friendly but a truly excellent album!
Also, I understand where you’re coming from Shaun, especially in this comment:
“Because Casting Crowns and Jeremy Camp have some hits that in my opinion suck as songs. And then there’s Barlow Girl’s rip-offs of Evanescence and Todd Agnew’s Creed v2.0. “
I’ll admit, the bands named there might not have the greatest works of “art” (there’s that ill-defined word again), however, they can be fun to listen to (for some people). I’ll use myself as an example; I love music that is more “art” like – Andrew Osenga’s stuff, some of your own stuff, the music that is more dare I even say “deep” but I also sometimes just enjoy listening to the fun more fluffy music. I love mixing it up – I can listen to Barlow Girl one song and then listen to The Normals in the next moment.
Now, I can’t say I know the intentions of all the artists you named, but I’ll take on the Barlow Girl comment for a moment, because I’ve talked to them a fair amount and know a little bit what is on their hearts. I don’t think they are making music for “art”, I think they are trying to make music that 1)speaks to teen girls and sometimes even challenges them to not be like everyone else and 2)is fun. I think they accomplish that. As far as them sounding like Evanescence, they claim (and I believe them) that they weren’t all that familiar with the group and they definitely were not trying to sound like them. Granted, I figure the record company or at least their producer (good ol’ Sugar Bear) probably was familiar with it and that was a big reason behind it, but that’s not where the girls heart is. They aren’t trying to rip off other bands – they are just some young girls enjoying life and having fun. Is it wrong for radio stations to play music like that? I don’t know.
As for Jeremy Camp, all I have to say about that is that “Though my praise was few” is not proper english. C’mon… none of us are perfect at the english language, but at least get it right in a song you’re going to release to radio. My wife turns off the radio every time that song comes on because that line hurts here ears…
And on a final note, I completely agree with you Shaun on the music testing with our listeners – I also think that it’s flawed, and I’ve voiced my opinion on the matter in the past. Don’t know if it will ever change, and I won’t go into all the reasons why I think it’s flawed, but needless to say, it is flawed. It’s worked okay, I guess, so what do I know? I’m not exactly the world’s foremost mind on research…
Alright, had to throw my last 2 cents in… I felt left out when there were so many comments and I hadn’t made any except for at the beginning! =0)
Tomcat says:
Wow! Thats alot to chew on and think about. While I don’t disagree with what was said, don’t know how to react just yet. Thanx for sharing.
WAY Employee says:
Thanks for sharing Andrew Osenga’s post. I’m always amazed by how many artists are still having problems with record labels saying their music is not Christian enough. While I’m not intimately involved with all the music decisions at WAY-FM, I have had an ear here and there, and I have to say, I’ve never heard anyone say they wouldn’t play a song because it isn’t Christian enough. If the song sounded right for our listeners, I would think we’d add it – I’m highly skeptical that WAY-FM would not add the song because of the word sad (as posted in the other days discussion, we are playing a song that says the artist curses God!). But, I guess when it comes down to it, that is us. I’m not as familiar with what many of the other Christian radio stations and such play nowadays, but from what I can see, I don’t think as many stations are concerned with songs being Christian enough any more (although I hear many of the labels are concerned because of it).
What most Christian radio stations I am familiar with are most interested in are songs that fit their format and test well sound wise with their listeners. Yeah, maybe they don’t want to hear the more complex music (I personally love some music that would never test well, and it doesn’t test well because it’s not the sound people go for).
I don’t think basing it on the sound people like to hear is a bad thing – it’s not about the money (at least, I don’t ever think of it as being that) but it’s about reaching as many listeners as possible.
Any way, just my 2 cents on this one =0)