Reviewed by Trevor Kirk

In all the years that I've been in Christian radio, I've lost count of the number of worship albums that I've had to audition that are by enthusiastic amateurs singing partly or wholly other people's material. Therefore, I lose no opportunity in encouraging churches and worship bands, that if they want radio air play, a good way to begin the quest to achieve it would be to write their own songs. This is what Redemption Church, Stevenage has done, and this 10 track CD has a run time of over an hour. Redemption's senior pastor Mark Neale states in the sleevenotes that the aim of the CD is to convey how the band sounds at a worship service or a conference, with all the spontaneity and occasional duff note or missed chord that such events inevitably contain. A very honest and refreshing approach, which I applaud. Production is in the capable hands of Phil Goss of Appletree Studios, and he's done a good job, given the "one take" nature of the exercise (the whole thing was done and dusted in one day!). The songs on the whole are quite a reasonable set, but the aforementioned duff notes and missed chords do detract from the thing as a listening experience, as does the longevity of some of the songs. A case in point is "A Thousand Miles", which is over nine minutes long, and some of the harmonies are seriously off, with the lead and the backing vocals equally to blame. I want to encourage Redemption to carry on the way they've started - but it won't happen overnight, so keep working on the songwriting and the performance, and keep playing the gigs to gain experience. It'll pay off in the long run.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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