Last week, we delved into the first 20 artists we posted about in our blog series, and we briefly checked up on them to see what they’re up to. Now… it’s time to see the next 20 artists. Do you want to know what’s happening to Newsboys, Backstreet Boys, Mandy Moore or Ed Sheeran?
Around a week ago, we took the leap and dived into artists #1 – #10 from the blog series of artists who are impactful and influential in this current generation now, and into the future, taking a glimpse at where artists like Rachel Platten, Tori Kelly, Zach Williams, Alessia Cara, Maren Morris and Jess Glynne are, right now currently in their life in 2022. Now, we tackle artists #11 – #20, and take a snapshot look at artists like Echosmith, Marc Martel, Philippa Hanna, Lauren Alaina, Little Mix and Dami Im, and where they are currently in this moment in terms of music. So check out these artists below, and be sure to check out the links below, to the original blog posts about these artists as well.
So… here we are. Just over 3 years since our first post of the blog series that ultimately changed how we (Jon and myself) listen to music and how we understand how God chooses to speak to us through music. Since that day in February in 2019 when we wrote about a crazy idea about writing about influential artists and why we believe them to be influential; we’ve since been on a musical journey that at first, we believed to be probably foolish. But now we both realise that we wouldn’t trade this experience for anything. As Christians, the assumption is that mainstream music is ‘evil’. But after 150 blogs (100 blogs about influential artists of all time, and 50 blogs about up-and-coming artists), we’ve found that, to the contrary, God uses all types of music to inspire us, encourage us, comfort us, and help us in this thing called life. You may not agree with Jon’s and my list. But that’s ok. Because we all have our preferences, and on things like this, it’s not worth splitting hairs over. I mean, is ‘this list doesn’t have my favourite artist on here!’ the hill you want to die on? No? I thought so.
It’s been about 3 years since our first post, and other variations of that time frame since all of the other blog posts. And it’s been about a few weeks since our blog post about Robbie Williams. And as such, we thought it would be fitting to write about the 100 artists (and 50 up-and-coming artists!) again- but in a more of a snapshot setting. A ‘where are they now?’ post, sort of a reflection post, a look back at 20 artists at a time (or in the case of the up-and-coming artists- 10 at a time!); just to see where they are at, and to reaffirm that we believe they’re still influential. Sure, you can read about all these artists on Wikipedia- but there’s something about a collated post where you can read about 20 artists at once! So… do you want to be reminded of why we chose the artists we did? Read on and be amazed and inspired by what’s happening in the lives of Michael W. Smith, Avril Lavigne, Delta Goodrem, Josh Groban, Casting Crowns and others!
So it’s been around 3 and a bit years since I started a blog series that would, for lack of a better term, revolutionise my life in terms of the music I would listen to, as I understood over the last few years, the vastness of music out there for one, but also, the notion and understanding as I grew up as a Christian in the 1990s, that mainstream music was downright ‘evil’, was totally false. Throughout my teen years, that notion of mainstream music = bad started to become undone, and it was this blog series that really stretched me in terms of what was deemed to be ‘mainstream’ and ‘Christian’, especially when over the last few years, there had been many collaborations in music between Christians and…well, everyone else. for KING & COUNTRY’s ‘Together’ was collaborated with Kirk Franklin & Tori Kelly, Tori herself also lent vocals to the smash-hit Cory Asbury penned ‘Reckless Love’, country singer-songwriter JoDee Messina also recorded her own version of the powerful (yet controversial) worship hit ‘Reckless Love’; while Lecrae collaborated with artists like John Legend (Drown) and Ty Dolla $ign (Blessings), whilst his song ‘Comin’ in Hot’, a collaboration between himself and fellow CHH artist Andy Mineo, has gained the most traction and popularity (out of all of Lecrae’s songs) amongst the mainstream music media space…ever.
In 2020, Chris Tomlin collaborated with a whole bunch of country artists (Lady A, Brett Young, Cassadee Pope, Thomas Rhett, Florida Georgia Line) for the country/CCM crossover album Chris Tomlin & Friends, while not too long ago, Tauren Wells and H.E.R. unveiled one of the unlikeliest of collaborations…ever. ‘Hold Us Together’ has been a powerful song since it’s unveiling as just a H.E.R. song as the end credits to the Disney + movie Safety, but the song took on new life when it was re-released around six months later with the injection of Tauren’s vocals, making the song, that already had a gospel feeling, become more worshipful…who am I kidding. The song was already worshipful. TobyMac and Sheryl Crow came together just this year to re-record Toby’s most recent single hit, ‘Promised Land’, and who knows, that could release on country/folk/Americana radio in the future…maybe. Christian and mainstream continued to collide over the years, with for KING AND COUNTRY & Echosmith collaborating on the duo’s chart-topping radio hit ‘God Only Knows’, while Joel & Luke also collaborated with one of Country music’s OG artists, Dolly Parton, for said same song. Dolly also lent her vocals to another CCM artist’s track, Zach Williams’s ‘There Was Jesus’, to much critical and commercial acclaim, while country music’s representation within CCM didn’t end there, with up and coming country artist Carly Pearce delivered a duet with Matthew West on the track ‘Truth Be Told’, a song that I reckon, sounds better as a duet. Up and coming country artist Lauren Alaina and up and coming CCM/pop artist Riley Clemmons created what I reckon is one of my favourite duets in recent memory, ‘Over and Over’, around a couple of years ago (a song that could’ve succeeded in country radio, but was never given a chance), and let’s all not forget that all those years ago, needtobreathe collaborated with pop icon (at the time) Gavin DeGraw (who’s still making music now, but not as popular as before) on the 2014 CCM-pop crossover hit, ‘Brother’? I say all this to say, that over the years, the lines between Christian and gospel music, and everything else, seems to be blurring together. And that is ok.
They say that your teenage years are your most formative. I don’t know if that’s a fact or not, but I remember it being said somewhere. I’ve since found an article that I’ve linked above, but throughout my whole life, I was told that the years from 12-19 are the years where the human mind is most impressionable; and that from your 20’s and 30’s and into adulthood, while you’re exploring the world around you, your ideas are more or less and mostly fully formed and set. That’s not to say that you can’t ever change or do a 180 later on in life if you so choose to do so. But by and large, the majority of people develop most of their values, thoughts, morals, ethics and who they want to be, well before they turn 20. Is this a good thing? Is this a bad thing? Dunno, it’s just something that I’ve been thinking and surmising about. And in relation to this blog about influential artists and what Jon and I listen to these days; if we follow that logic, then Jon and myself, who were ‘sheltered’ and listening to only Christian music before in the 2000’s, shouldn’t even be writing this blog. We should be so dogmatic and set in our views about music… but we aren’t. We’ve allowed God to shape us and mould us, while we listen to uplifting, inspiring, and thought-provoking music, not necessarily by Christian artists; all the while holding onto our faith and keeping close our non-negotiables in the faith and what we believe to be primary issues in the doctrines of Christianity. We’ve grown in our love and appreciation for artists like Keith Urban, Little Mix, Selena Gomez, Maren Morris, Goo Goo Dolls, John Mayer, Jackie Evancho, John Legend, Carrie Underwood, Owl City, Delta Goodrem, Avril Lavigne, Thomas Rhett, Lindsay Ell, The Shires, Taylor Swift, Beyonce, and most recently Mickey Guyton and Kylie Minogue, to name a few. We’ve discovered and realised that the divide between Christian music and mainstream music is becoming blurrier and blurrier (and that can be seen as a good or bad thing, depending on your point of view!), and we’ve understood much more throughout these three years about music, God, life, death, the hard questions and everything else… than I guess any other time in my life. I’m sure Jon can testify to that. Yet if we are to believe that article above that our teenage years are the years in which we learn the most, then why am I at 32, announcing that the last 3 years have been the time in my life when I have learnt the most, predominately through this blog series about influential artists?
Continue reading MOMENTOUS MONDAYS: INFLUENTIAL ARTISTS OF ALL TIME – WEEK 100: ROBBIE WILLIAMS
There have been sometimes throughout my 3+ year musical journey of appreciation and expansion beyond my comfort space of CCM, where I’ve thought that this journey I went on (all because of a bold and daring post, way back in February 2019); was indeed futile. I mean, how could someone embark on something so foreign, when all that they’ve known is something so different to what was being set before them? For someone to grow up within and around CCM and worship music, to write about, by and large, mainstream artists, can seem a little weird to the uninitiated, or maybe even downright heretical (or even liberating and freeing, whichever way you look at it). Either way, what I was getting into was nothing trivial- what I was about to embark upon was either going to affirm the music I believed in, or maybe even challenge it to its very core. Looking back on 3 years of listening to music that I don’t think I would’ve touched with a ten foot pole, had it not been for this blog series; I think I’ve done both. Affirmed the music I believe in; and challenged it at the same time. Artists like the Newsboys, Michael W. Smith, Amy Grant, Steven Curtis Chapman, needtobreathe, Switchfoot, Skillet, Rebecca St. James, Tenth Avenue North, for KING & COUNTRY, dc Talk, Jason Gray, Andrew Peterson, Carman, Delirious?, Chris Tomlin, Jon Foreman, Hillsong, Philippa Hanna, Apollo LTD, Lauren Daigle, Matthew West, Zach Williams and Casting Crowns, were all present on either the top 100 influential artists blog post list, alongside the 50 artists influential right now and into the future, and it was through all these artists I aforementioned above, that my faith in Christ has deepened, widened, and expanded so much more than I ever thought humanly possible. While it was mainstream artists like Josh Groban, Owl City, Martina McBride, Backstreet Boys, Ed Sheeran, Shania Twain, Cimorelli, Jackie Evancho, Sugarland, Little Big Town, John Mayer, Daughtry and Phil Collins (to name a few), that have reminded me this very one thing, that this little thing called music, shouldn’t be something that we need to argue about.
At this stage in our blog series, with 2 artists to go before we tackle the iconic and legendary artists who are on a whole other stratosphere (like Queen, The Beatles, Elton John, Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Celine Dion and others); I guess you could say that these next two artists, possibly would be arbitrary. Like I could pick any two artists, and they’d be valid. You may not agree with them, but they’d still be valid. And this is for many reasons. Obviously, there are thousands upon thousands of artists who have not made Jon’s and my list (for various reasons), inclusive of artists like Foo Fighters, Kesha, Miranda Lambert, Blake Shelton, KJ-52, Pussycat Dolls, Snoop Dogg, Mumford & Sons, Guns’N’Roses, Daryl Braithwaite, and Kacey Chambers. Other artists whom I have not included in this blog series (and possibly also won’t feature in the list of 50 iconic legendary artists) are Mister Mister, INXS, Flyleaf, The Script, Marina Prior, James Arthur, Midnight Oil and Eskimo Joe. Maybe it’s because the scope of this blog series is maybe too broad (we’re including artists who are influential across time periods, genres as well as who we deem to be influential on a personal level!); and it is possibly because of the presence of CCM artists in this blog series, that many readers may indeed scratch their heads. Chris Tomlin, Hillsong (all facets), Delirious?, Newsboys, Rebecca St. James, dc Talk, Casting Crowns, Steven Curtis Chapman, for KING & COUNTRY, Andrew Peterson, Jason Gray, Lecrae, Tenth Avenue North, Michael W. Smith, Carman and Amy Grant… possibly wouldn’t make a ‘normal’ influential artist list if another person were compiling this list; while it would also be debatable if Switchfoot, Skillet or Needtobreathe would make this list too. While Jon and I both have our reasons for including Christian artists on our list (because we are believers, and these aforementioned artists have impacted our faith and our journey in life quite heavily!); this means that other noteworthy artists miss out. And that’s just the fact of life.
Continue reading MOMENTOUS MONDAYS: INFLUENTIAL ARTISTS OF ALL TIME – WEEK 99: KYLIE MINOGUE
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I catch myself thinking, as I’m lying in bed, ready to go to sleep- ‘why does this world have to be so divided?’ And it’s not just ‘I follow baseball and you follow basketball and therefore there’s this division and rivalry’, or even ‘my team is the Sydney Sixers, and your team is the Brisbane Heat, and thus because of our support of different teams, we ought to act ‘hostile’ and ‘divided’ against each other’. No, it’s more than that. I’ve found out recently that this division the world is seeing right now across many sectors, is much more than a temporary rivalry that’s sport-related, that when we’re in this ‘sport bubble’ we’re ‘enemies’ but outside of that, we’re friends. It’s much more deep-rooted, and much more involuntarily ‘taken-on’ as our ‘identity’, than many of us would care to even admit. Let’s just take a look at the few rivalries that we know of, as we’ve been observing in the world over the past decade or so. There’s the Christians against…well, everyone else? There seems to be a rivalry right now that pits the Christians and the LGBTQAI+ people against each other, not to mention Christians and atheists that have been having discussions before the beginning of time, too. Here in Australia, there’s Labour V Liberal (and in America, there’s Republicans V Democrats), while since COVID-19 has started up in early 2020, there’s been the ‘other’ rivalry that people don’t like to talk about- those who are vaccinated, against those who are hard-line anti-vaxxers, for whatever reason. And these rivalries are not just for anything trivial.
I think I’ve confidently asserted this statement many times throughout the years, but I think I will say it again. The year of 2021, like the year of 2020, has delivered time and time again, in terms of presenting to us some pretty inspiring and thought-provoking albums and songs. Though hectic, chaotic, seemingly out of control and messy; 2021, more than 2020, was the year in which I have grown the most in my musical tastes, and it’s the year that I have found more albums and songs that has resonated with me. But maybe that’s because I was more aware of releases this year than any other year. Partly because of me branching out into different types of music because of my own accord due to me being more at home due to COVID-19, and also partly because of me and Jon writing our blog series about influential artists of all time- and us being exposed to more different types of music that way.
Continue reading BEST OF 2021- PART 3: TOP 25 ANTICIPATED ALBUMS OF 2022
Hey everyone… guess what! COVID-19 is still here- this time as the Omicron version (no surprises there!)… and some of us are still self-quarantined at home. This means that a few music albums, movies and TV shows have all been put on hold and delayed until a later date when it is safe to film… but that doesn’t mean we can’t jam out to inspiring music videos! This past year has been quite crazy and eventful; but there have been some heartfelt, poigant, emotional and just fun-filled music videos that have debuted. So without further ado, let me present to you all our favourite 50 music videos as a site for the year of 2021! So sit back, be inspired, and let these music videos minister to you during this time of uncertainty!
Continue reading BEST OF 2021- PART 2: TOP 50 MUSIC VIDEOS OF 2021