Winter Jam 2011: Rocked Denver

Posted on November 4, 2011 by Eliza Marie
[media-cred­it id=259 align=“aligncenter” width=“480”]Red at Winter Jam 2011 [/me­dia-cred­it]

Red starts the show with flames a fly­ing.

This is my Twit­ter ver­sion of the con­cert. It rocked.

News­boys closed the show with “Jesus Freak” and Dun­can twirling, spin­ning on/in his ele­vat­ed drum kit plat­form. Michael Tait is tru­ly an enter­tain­er. Had the crowd laugh­ing while stat­ing the mes­sage “God’s Not Dead.” Also the band filmed a video of “God’s Not Dead,” and it sound­ed dead-on. The CD releas­es this month.

Matthew West per­formed his cur­rent hit song off his CD — Strong Enough, and More. Kut­less with one of my favorites, Strong Tow­er. Dis­ap­point­ed Fire­flight did­n’t play a longer set. They are a fun rock­ing band.

And RED set the place on fire, lit­er­al­ly with flames shoot­ing 30 feet in the air. Those are some hard rock­ers.

That’s it for now, got­ta get the com­put­er in the shop.

Peace

[media-cred­it id=259 align=“aligncenter” width=“480”]Newsboys performs at Winter Jam at Magness Arena Denver[/me­dia-cred­it]

News­boys per­forms at Win­ter Jam at Mag­ness Are­na Den­ver

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Seth Smith picks winner in The City Harmonic

Posted on November 3, 2011 by Eliza Marie

If you’ve been to a few Col­orado Rock­ies’ games this year, you might be famil­iar with The City Har­mon­ic’s song “Man­i­festo” — it was the Seth Smith’s walkup song.

And Smith’s choice in music is right on as the band received the New Artist of the Year Award by the Gospel Music Asso­ci­a­tion Cana­da last week. The song “Man­i­festo” won for Record­ed Song of the Year and Mod­ern Wor­ship Song of the Year.

The band is cur­rent­ly on tour and will be join­ing the News­boys on their God’s Not Dead tour next year. Here’s a link.

http://youtu.be/59sH_oCC1rg

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Seth Smith picks winner in The City Harmonic

Posted on November 3, 2011 by Eliza Marie

If you’ve been to a few Col­orado Rock­ies’ games this year, you might be famil­iar with The City Har­mon­ic’s song “Man­i­festo” — it was the Seth Smith’s walkup song.

And Smith’s choice in music is right on as the band received the New Artist of the Year Award by the Gospel Music Asso­ci­a­tion Cana­da last week. The song “Man­i­festo” won for Record­ed Song of the Year and Mod­ern Wor­ship Song of the Year.

The band is cur­rent­ly on tour and will be join­ing the News­boys on their God’s Not Dead tour next year. Here’s a link.

http://youtu.be/59sH_oCC1rg

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Best Broncos’ headline: Lions 45, Christians 10

Posted on October 31, 2011 by Eliza Marie

We have a “pool” at work on head­lines for big sto­ries, and we talk about them, pick­ing the best for the paper. Well, this one popped up. It made me laugh, then today I was think­ing you know it’s a metaphor for Chris­tians liv­ing in a main­stream world. Chris­tians are thrown to the lions every­day and are bom­bard­ed by the media — Inter­net, TV, music, news­pa­pers — by things that don’t agree with their prin­ci­ples.

Your thoughts and how do you han­dle it? Hal­loween is a per­fect exam­ple.

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Newsboys turn town crier with CD, Winter Jam

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Eliza Marie

“God’s not dead,” blares a head­line on the black-and-white cov­er of  the News­boys’ lat­est album, which depicts a late 19th cen­tu­ry news­boy hawk­ing papers on a city street.

And many would say that the procla­ma­tion is just not news in the 21st cen­tu­ry, but not Michael Tait, the band’s newest mem­ber and front­man.

“In today’s age we see more and more young peo­ple and adults who say they are in the athe­ist cat­e­go­ry that there is no God,” Tait said.  “And we are here to say that God is alive and well. He is the foun­da­tion of our faith, and it’s a reaf­fir­ma­tion of  that belief. And we are roar­ing like a lion.”

Tait and the News­boys, which are known for their high ener­gy live shows that fea­ture drum­mer Dun­can Phillips and his ele­vat­ed rotat­ing drumk­it, are part of the Win­ter Jam tour that kicks off its 2011 fall dates at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Denver’s Mag­ness Are­na on Thurs­day Nov. 3 It marks the first time in Win­ter Jam’s 16-year his­to­ry that the mul­ti-band con­cert will be head­ing West.

“God’s Not Dead” is also the name of the band’s album that releas­es Nov. 15 and is the first true wor­ship CD by the 18-year-old group. But don’t for­get this is the hard-rock­ing News­boys and the band puts its mark on such stan­dards as “Mighty to Save,” ”For­ev­er Reign” and “Your Love Nev­er Fails.”

“We want­ed to do the songs jus­tice,” Tait explained. “It’s like a Christ­mas record, how many times have you heard the songs, and you fig­ure out that Nat King Cole does it the best. So we set out to do that the best we can.”

“This is the first offi­cial wor­ship album that is full on News­boys. It’s bad to the bone.”

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Newsboys turn town crier with CD, Winter Jam tour

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Eliza Marie

“God’s not dead,” blares a head­line on the black-and-white cov­er of the News­boys’ lat­est album, which depicts a late 19th cen­tu­ry news­boy hawk­ing papers on a city street.

And many would say that the procla­ma­tion is just not news in the 21st cen­tu­ry, but not Michael Tait, the band’s newest mem­ber and front­man.

“In today’s age we see more and more young peo­ple and adults who say they are in the athe­ist cat­e­go­ry that there is no God,” Tait said. “And we are here to say that God is alive and well. He is the foun­da­tion of our faith, and it’s a reaf­fir­ma­tion of that belief. And we are roar­ing like a lion.”

Tait and the News­boys, which are known for their high ener­gy live shows that fea­ture drum­mer Dun­can Phillips and his ele­vat­ed rotat­ing drumk­it, are part of the Win­ter Jam tour that kicks off its 2011 fall dates at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Denver’s Mag­ness Are­na on Thurs­day Nov. 3 It marks the first time in Win­ter Jam’s 16-year his­to­ry that the mul­ti-band con­cert will be head­ing West.

“God’s Not Dead” is also the name of the band’s album that releas­es Nov. 15 and is the first true wor­ship CD by the 18-year-old group. But don’t for­get this is the hard-rock­ing News­boys and the band puts its mark on such stan­dards as “Mighty to Save,” ”For­ev­er Reign” and “Your Love Nev­er Fails.”

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Steven Curtis Chapman back from “valley of death”

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Eliza Marie
Steven Curtis Chapman on the cover of re*create

Five-time Gram­my Award win­ner Steven Cur­tis Chap­man is expe­ri­ence a new sea­son of music and will be bring­ing his tour to Mis­sion Hills Church in LIt­tle­ton on Sat­ur­day, Oct. 22. | Cour­tesy pho­to

It’s been more than three years since the death of his lit­tle girl, Marie, 5, in a trag­ic acci­dent at their home, but Steve Cur­tis Chap­man and his fam­i­ly are final­ly climb­ing out of the abyss of depres­sion with “new music in a new sea­son.”

“That’s what this tour is about,” Chap­man said, “to let our fans know that we’re OK. I have to use my wife’s words: It’s like we are tak­ing the first steps out of a deep, dense for­est since the acci­dent at home. (Maria was run over in the family’s dri­ve­way by a SUV dri­ven by one of their sons.) We are in a new sea­son with new songs, new life. We have a new grand­ba­by on the way. We are mak­ing some major changes at the house that have been a long time com­ing. In a sense we have pep in our steps. There’s more laugh­ter at the house and that reflects in this tour.”

Chap­man’s tour, Song & Sto­ries Tour, is in sup­port of his new album “re*creation* and fea­tures Chap­man play­ing small­er venues while tak­ing his music back to his Ken­tucky roots.

“There’s not an elec­tric gui­tar on stage. It’s stripped down,” Chap­man said. “I’m far more com­fort­able in this set­ting. In my biggest moment — the big are­na days, the four busses and three or four semis — I was still just this kid from Pud­u­c­ah, Ken­tucky, sit­ting in my bed­room writ­ing songs. I’m a singer-song­writer.

“In the are­na days I had to make myself com­fort­able by sit­ting on a stool telling my sto­ries. Now we are tak­ing it in that direc­tion with this tour. I’m tak­ing these songs back to their orig­i­nal state — They were all writ­ten on an acoustic gui­tar.”

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Steven Curtis Chapman back from “valley of death”

Posted on October 21, 2011 by Eliza Marie
Steven Curtis Chapman on cover of re*create

Five-time Gram­my Award win­ner Steven Cur­tis Chap­man is expe­ri­enc­ing a “new sea­son of music,” and he will be bring­ing his tour at Mis­sion Hills Church on Sat­ur­day, Oct. 22. | Cour­tesy pho­to

It’s been more than three years since the death of his lit­tle girl, Marie, 5, in a trag­ic acci­dent at their home, but Steve Cur­tis Chap­man and his fam­i­ly are final­ly climb­ing out of the abyss of depres­sion with “new music in a new sea­son.”

“That’s what this tour is about,” Chap­man said, “to let our fans know that we’re OK. I have to use my wife’s words: It’s like we are tak­ing the first steps out of a deep, dense for­est since the acci­dent at home. (Maria was run over in the family’s dri­ve­way by a SUV dri­ven by one of their sons.) We are in a new sea­son with new songs, new life. We have a new grand­ba­by on the way. We are mak­ing some major changes at the house that have been a long time com­ing. In a sense we have pep in our steps. There’s more laugh­ter at the house and that reflects in this tour.”

Chap­man will bring his Song & Sto­ries Tour to Mis­sion Hills Church in Lit­tle­ton on Sat­ur­day, Oct. 22. The tour fea­tures Chap­man play­ing small­er venues while tak­ing his music back to his Ken­tucky roots.

“There’s not an elec­tric gui­tar on stage. It’s stripped down,” Chap­man said. “I’m far more com­fort­able in this set­ting. In my biggest moment — the big are­na days, the four busses and three or four semis — I was still just this kid from Pud­u­c­ah, Ken­tucky, sit­ting in my bed­room writ­ing songs. I’m a singer-song­writer.

“In the are­na days I had to make myself com­fort­able by sit­ting on a stool telling my sto­ries. Now we are tak­ing it in that direc­tion with this tour. I’m tak­ing these songs back to their orig­i­nal state — They were all writ­ten on an acoustic gui­tar.”

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Dan Wheldon interview at Indy

Posted on October 16, 2011 by Eliza Marie

Here’s a video of Dan Whel­don at the Indy 500. It shows why he was so loved by his col­leagues. He is a “Charmer.”

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David Crowder Band won’t Brett Favre you

Posted on October 14, 2011 by Eliza Marie
[media-cred­it id=259 align=“aligncenter” width=“470”]The David Crowder Bance[/me­dia-cred­it]

David Crow­der Band, which will dis­band after its 7 tour, per­forms Fri­day. Oct. 13 at the Ogden The­ater. | Cour­tesy pho­to

Dig deep in you wal­let if you want to catch the David Crowder*Band’s last show at the Ogden The­atre on Fri­day, Oct. 14. The show quick­ly sold out, and after check­ing the venue’s web­site, tick­ets are being offered at $118 to $275 – and that’s for a gen­er­al admis­sion venue. The six-piece band is call­ing it quits after mak­ing Chris­t­ian con­tem­po­rary music for 11 years to “find the space” to explore oth­er inter­ests.

And the band is not going out with a whim­per. As their last project the guys decid­ed to tack­le a Mass – a Requiem to be exact.

Eliza Marie Somers: David, how is the Mass project com­ing along?

David Crow­der: It’s in the mix­ing process. Off to the engi­neer to make us sound good. (Chuck­les) It releas­es Jan. 10. The Requiem Mass is the old­est exist­ing form of church music. It’s a con­tain­er to write into. There’s a very strict for­mat, and we stuck to that strin­gent­ly. We used some of the lan­guage that was there, but we didn’t want it seem like church music — it’s an eclec­tic mix. I think it’s the best thing that we have done. No doubt. It’s 34 tracks we worked real­ly, real­ly hard on this vehi­cle. It’s such a sig­nif­i­cant con­tain­er to write to and it was a very free­ing thing to do at the same time.

EMS: Did you lis­ten to the old mas­ters for the Mass?

DC: We dug into all of that to get a good sense to the tone; Mozart has the best requiem. But we didn’t want our record to sound so bleak … dum dum da-dum. That would be a tough sell. We want­ed it to feel more like a cel­e­bra­tion as such. The title is — par­don us, but this is just what we do — “Give Us Rest (A Requiem Mass in C [The Hap­pi­est of All Keys]).” Death is sad, but for us in the church it’s also a glo­ri­ous time. We need to mourn, but there’s a lot to be excit­ed about.

EMS: Why the breakup and what’s next for you and the guys?

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Interview: Switchfoot’s Jon Foreman

Posted on October 12, 2011 by Eliza Marie

By John Mey­er, The Den­ver Post

[media-cred­it name=“Courtesy pho­to” align=“aligncenter” width=“470”]Switchfoot promotion photo[/me­dia-cred­it]

Switch­foot will per­form at the Boul­der The­ater on Oct. 7.

Switch­foot takes its name from a surf­ing term, but it could also describe their approach to spir­i­tu­al­i­ty in their music – one foot in this world, the oth­er in the next. Their most recent album, Vice Vers­es (released Sept. 27) is one of their most open­ly spir­i­tu­al efforts. Front­man Jon Fore­man told a Red Rocks audi­ence in April that Vice Vers­es would be their”best attempt at a wor­ship record,” and it cer­tain­ly is that. Den­ver Post reporter John Mey­er inter­viewed Fore­man before the band’s sold-out show Oct. 7 at the Boul­der The­ater.


John Mey­er: There are a bunch of songs on Vice Vers­es that are prayers: After­life, Blind­ing Light, Thrive, Rest­less, Vice Vers­es, Where I Belong. What’s it like to write and per­form songs like that, espe­cial­ly when you’re hop­ing to reach a main­stream audi­ence?


Jon Fore­man: I nev­er sub­di­vide humans into cat­e­gories of Chris­t­ian or Mus­lim or athe­ist or agnos­tic. I feel like, even ear­ly on, play­ing all sorts of places – whether it was cof­fee shops or bars or col­leges or church­es, what­ev­er we could – there’s hurt­ing peo­ple every­where that are try­ing to look for mean­ing and pur­pose and beau­ty, find­ing it in rela­tion­ships or a sports team or a song or in reli­gion.

For me, I’ve always been attract­ed to peo­ple who are telling the truth, so that’s one thing we’ve tried to do as a band — just tell the truth. From day one, we’ve nev­er been one to shy away from what we believe. We’ve always been very straight­for­ward and hon­est about it.

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Switchfoot interview

Posted on October 7, 2011 by Eliza Marie

My col­league John Mey­er had a one-on-one phone inter­view with Jon Fore­man of Switch­foot. Here’s the link

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David Crowder Band “won’t Brett Favre anybody”

Posted on October 7, 2011 by Eliza Marie
David Crowder Band

The David Crow­der Band will be break­ing up after this tour. The tour stops in Den­ver on Fri­day, Oct. 14 at the Ogden The­atre. | Cour­tesy pho­to

Dig deep in you wal­let if you want to catch the David Crowder*Band’s last show at the Ogden The­atre on Fri­day, Oct. 14. The show quick­ly sold out, and after check­ing the venue’s web­site, tick­ets are being offered at $118 to $275 – and that’s for a gen­er­al admis­sion venue. The six-piece band is call­ing it quits after mak­ing Chris­t­ian con­tem­po­rary music for 11 years to “find the space” to explore oth­er inter­ests.

And the band is not going out with a whim­per. As their last project the guys decid­ed to tack­le a Mass – a Requiem to be exact.

Eliza Marie Somers: David, how is the Mass project com­ing along?

 David Crow­der: It’s in the mix­ing process. Off to the engi­neer to make us sound good. (Chuck­les) It releas­es Jan. 10. The Requiem Mass is the old­est exist­ing form of church music. It’s a con­tain­er to write into. There’s a very strict for­mat, and we stuck to that strin­gent­ly. We used some of the lan­guage that was there, but we didn’t want it seem like church music — it’s an eclec­tic mix. I think it’s the best thing that we have done. No doubt. It’s 34 tracks we worked real­ly, real­ly hard on this vehi­cle. It’s such a sig­nif­i­cant con­tain­er to write to and it was a very free­ing thing to do at the same time.

 EMS: Did you lis­ten to the old mas­ters for the Mass?

DC:  We dug into all of that to get a good sense to the tone;  Mozart has the best requiem. But we didn’t want our record to sound so bleak … dum dum da-dum. That would be a tough sell. We want­ed it to feel more like a cel­e­bra­tion as such. The title is — par­don us, but this is just what we do — “Give Us Rest (A Requiem Mass in C [The Hap­pi­est of All Keys]).” Death is sad, but for us in the church it’s also a glo­ri­ous time. We need to mourn, but there’s a lot to be excit­ed about.

 EMS: Why the breakup and what’s next for you and the guys?

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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Use music to ele­vate your fre­quen­cy as often as pos­si­ble since it bathes you in shim­mer­ing light that deflects neg­a­tiv­i­ty. - Heal­ing Words from the Angels, Doreen Virtue

Posted on September 26, 2011 by Eliza Marie | Leave a comment

“The Love in Between” strengthens Matt Maher

Posted on September 26, 2011 by Eliza Marie
matt maher cover of The love in Between

Pho­to cour­tesy of Prov­i­dent Label Group

Matt Maher plays on his strengths by expand­ing on his Amer­i­cana-folk-coun­try sound with the release of “The Love in Between,” his third CD on Essen­tial Records. In the past few weeks I find myself con­stant­ly reach­ing for this CD. I like the coun­try-rock vibe that res­onates across the 12 songs. Maher calls it “blue col­lar gospel.”

And it’s not just the music that deliv­ers strong vocals it’s the lyrics. Lyrics that pose some tough ques­tions to the lis­ten­er.

His first sin­gle “Turn Around,” is get­ting major air­time on the Chris­t­ian radio sta­tions and show­cas­es the theme of this CD, with even a “Hey” thrown in there. The song spot­lights the trou­ble of an addict, a moth­er try­ing to make ends meet and calls us to real­ize that God’s grace is there to help us in all of our sit­u­a­tions.

You don’t have to take the bro­ken road
You can turn around and come back home

Con­tin­ue read­ing →

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