Reviewed by Trevor Kirk A 10 track CD from Mark, a resident of the US state of Arkansas, and a very well known name on the sleeve is that of Jonathan David Brown, who did the production. Mark's vocal style, whilst firmly US Bible belt Southern gospel, is pretty accurate on the whole, although he does struggle a bit in the upper register: he's more comfortable as a baritone rather than a tenor, but there's little light and shade in his voice, which doesn't help. The production is reasonable, although the synths don't have a great variety of sounds, so it begins to sound a bit samey after a while, and the CD cover is a decidedly cheesy picture of Mark and his missus in a field of flowers, gazing adoringly into each other's eyes. However, my main problem with this album is the choice of material. The sleevenotes tell us that the songs have been "carefully chosen", and Mark has borrowed from a plethora of excellent songsmiths, including Kim Hill, Don Francisco, Matt and Beth Redman, Todd Agnew, Dwight Liles and Scott Krippayne (both the latter have their names mis-spelt, which is a bad sign). I recognised Matt and Beth's classic "Blessed Be Your Name", and Todd Agnew's radio hit from 2003 "Grace Like Rain", but it would take something particularly spectacular to improve on the composer's cuts - predictably, Mark doesn't do either of them justice. Apart from those two, there's nothing that can muster more energy than a slow foxtrot, and long before the end my attention was wandering.
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Oh, thank you Trevor. I'm sorry I bored you to sleep. Maybe you should get more sleep before you review peoples work. One thing I found out today while looking at the cheesy cover is that apparently a lot of places have mp3's of my album and never even let me know they were selling songs. Nice to find out. I guess that's one reason I dumped "Christianity" for Deism. Stay well!