Encyclopedia of Contemporary Christian Music--Book and CD-ROM

This groundbreaking work covers both major and minor Christian music artists and those associated with Christian music from the Â’60s to the present day, highlighting their influences, their struggles, and their achievements. Powell treats each artist or group with a balanced, intriguing, and fresh look into their background and discography. Every entry summarizes critical response to the group, and provides band member lists, complete discographies, lists of awards, artist website addresses, and biographies of the artists. The fun, easy-to-read writing style provides fans with accessible information on their favorite artists, while also encouraging them to greater appreciation of the stylistic breadth and historical depth of the music they have come to love. The CD-ROM features a searchable version of the complete text for both Windows and Macintosh systems, as well as live links to artist-websites, album information, and music clips.

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Reviewed by Steve (MA), May 11, 2004

For any fan of Christian music this is a phenomenal resource. Find information on a performer or band that you haven't heard from in ages, learn more about your favorite groups or individual singer, or use it as a checklist for those larger-than-most music collections some of us have accrued over the years. Half the fun of this book is opening it up anywhere and finding something interesting about the industry. A list of music genres makes it easy to figure out what the writer means when coming across a strange musical style, and a complimentary CD-ROM version of the entire book makes it incredibly easy to find exactly what you are looking for.

Reviewed by Brent Wilcox (Marietta, GA), October 01, 2002

Everything You Could Want, And Then . . . Something More! First, this book does deliver everything that anybody could ever want in a reference book on Christian music. Every artist is included. There are complete discographies, personnel lists, bios, updates on "where are they now," summaries of album reviews, and lists of chart hits. For some that may be all they want or need. The “something more” is that the author also provides his own critical analysis of the music. This is easy to skip, if you don’t care about it. But it isn’t commentary by just anyone. Mark Allan Powell is one of the most prominent theologians of the late twentieth-century, a world-famous, prominent author and profound analyst of religion and culture. Still, he writes in such a humorous and friendly, easy-going style that you’d never suspect it’s the same guy responsible for all those intellectual tomes for which he's won academic accolades(of course, he’s also been a professional music critic for about thirty years now, writing about rock and roll “as a hobby” for newspapers and popular magazines). Powell presents his book as a gift to Christian music artists, industry, and fans--“people who have made my life more pleasant and meaningful.” What a gift it is! This is the first time that anyone of this stature has ever even noticed the little “parallel universe” of Christian rock, much less taken such care to document it or invested himself so personally in commenting on it. The comments are so incisive that, even if they were negative, the criticism would be welcome. But–good news!–he loves the music and consistently discovers what is best about every artist. The book isn’t just informative–it’s positive, upbeat, inspiring, and a whole lot of fun!

Reviewed by Lester Long (Portland, OR), September 27, 2002

For Any Christian Who Likes Rock and Roll This book is an absolute treasure–an incredible achievement! Over 1900 entries containing everything that anyone could ever want to know about any artist even remotely connected with Christian music. There are full, entries on all of the big name Christian stars, appropriate listings of mainstream artists whose recordings have sometimes dealt explicitly with matters of faith, reminiscences and updates on long-forgotten Christian artists from years ago,and major articles on critics’ favorites–edgy artists who don’t get a lot of attention in the official Christian music scene but who have made some of the best music the field has to offer. If you’re a Christian music fan–this is the book you’ve been waiting for! But even more important! This book would make the best gift imaginable for someone you know who likes rock or pop music, but might be kind of skeptical about the whole Christian rock scene. The author has a delightfully disarming style and he doesn't come off as though he's trying to sell the music. He just helps you find which of the artists may be to your liking. The result, is that he kind of sneaks up on you. He obviously loves this music but he doesn’t take it too seriously. He is witty, provocative, and never, ever forgets that rock and roll (even Christian rock and roll) is supposed to be fun. So,if you know some Christian who reads Rolling Stone but not CCM--buy this for them! They'll see Creed and U2 and read around a bit. They'll think Powell is funny and they'll read some more. Next thing you know . . . well, if ANYONE can turn them on to Jesus music, this is the person (and book) that will do it.

Reviewed by John J. Tollefsen (Snohomish County), September 26, 2002

The strength of Mark Allan Powell’s Encyclopedia of Christian Contemporary Music is its humorous opinions (bad music about God by white people) and is thoroughness (Eric Clapton). These are also its weaknesses. Those who want a scholarly resource to use in this area of church history will be somewhat disappointed by the flippant opinionated approach. Those who want to understand the field and not be put to sleep while doing so will be appreciative of the author’s witty style. While far from perfect, Powell has found a way to launch an important work despite skeptical publishers. Let’s hope subsequent iterations turn it into a more serious multi-volume hardback series that is the definitive resource for Christian contemporary Music.

Reviewed by Phil (Canton, OH), September 15, 2002

When I first heard about this book, my first thought was "it's about time". I pre-ordered my copy a month in advance, and anxiously awaited its arrival. Since the title of the book clearly states "encyclopedia", I took that to mean a presentation of facts. I was hoping for a book that would give me artist history, a discography, song titles, and possibly web sites. The promised "searchable" CD rom that was included led me to believe that I would be able to easily search for song titles, release dates, etc. I was hoping this would be a much needed resource for our worship team. Unfortunately, this is not the case. At first glance, I was pleasantly surprised at the depth and scope of the artists presented. However, upon further reading I was very disappointed at the authors comments and opinions that make reading the histories difficult. The discographies include only minimal information, with no song listings; except for what the author feels is "noteworthy". For groups, the band lineup is often difficult to decipher. And the CD, although it does feature selected music clips and websites, is basically just the text on CD. Mark Allan Powell has shown that he has an enormous knowledge of Contemporary Christian Music, and it's a shame he couldn't have put that to better use. Please retitle the book "Mark A Powell's opinion on CCM" which would be a more accurate description. That being said, this is a must have for any CCM fans until something better and more user-friendly comes along. If you are looking for reading material on a much overlooked subject, buy this book. If you are looking for resource material, you may want to wait.

Reviewed by Carol (Arizona), August 26, 2002

Unlike the previous reviewer, I loved the author's comments and opinions. I don't necessarily agree with all of them, but I don't think you can really love music without having opinions. The opinions are what make this encyclopedia stand apart from most dry, boring encyclopedias. This one is a pleasure to read!

Reviewed by Music fan (South Carolina), August 20, 2002

This book is impressive in both scope and detail. I was surprised to find information about a few of my favorite artists whom I felt were too little known to have been included. I was also delighted to discover a few artists with whom I was not previously familiar with, but will certainly check out. In fact, the only flaw I find with the book is the author's proclivity to share his opinions about the value of the work of each of the included artists. Some bias is expected and can be entertaining; but, to my mind, the author should have exercised a little more restraint in voicing his opinions. This book can only have been improved had the author limited his own opinions and allowed the lyrics and music clips of the respective albums to speak for the creativity of the work. I say this even though, given his comments below, the author and I share some of the same favorite authors and artists (e.g., Buechner, Nouwen, Lewis, Heard, Keaggy). The upside is that this bias is not too big of a problem so long as the discerning reader refuses to put too much stock in the author's judgments. With that said, I recommend this tome as a work of true value to the genre of CCM. Its contribution is unlikely to be surpassed.

Reviewed by Mark (Los Angeles), August 09, 2002

I am a long-time Christian music fan and I think this book/cd-rom is great. The book has so much information and the cd-rom makes it really easy to surf the web, checking out all the artist's websites.

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Author: Mark Allan Powell
Located in: Columbus, OH
Submitted: July 10, 2002

    Tell us a little about yourself.  I started out thirty years ago as a rock journalist but got caught up in “the Jesus movement revival” of the early ‘70s. My life was transformed and I went on to become an ordained minister and, then, a Bible scholar. I got fairly well known in that world and wrote some 17 books on Bible and theology. But with this book I’ve returned to my roots, to pay tribute to those people who have provided a soundtrack for my life. I’m married and we have four children, four cats, and a turtle.

    What was your motivation behind this project?  Contemporary Christian music is an important part of modern culture but I find that many people do not take it very seriously. My theologian friends tend to dismiss it as “shallow” or “superficial” and my rock critic friends just write it off as bad music. I am a theologian and a rock critic and I am here to say that (by and large) it is neither. I think that there are millions of people in our society– Christians and non-Christians–who would really enjoy this music and find their lives enriched it if they would only discover what is really available.

    What do you hope folks will gain from this project?  This book is for any Christian who likes popular music. Fans of what gets called “contemporary Christian music” will find a great resource here to learn more about their favorite artists and to discover other artists who they might have overlooked. But there are also a lot of Christians in this world who enjoy popular music but, for a variety of reasons, have never gotten into the ccm scene. I think this book will enable them to find out what is available, to get past some stereotypes, and to decide for themselves whether there might be more to contemporary Christian music than they thought.

    Who are your influences, sources of inspiration or favorite authors / artists?  In terms of Christian theology, I have been most influenced by the writings of Martin Luther, and by such authors writers as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Henri Nouwen, Frederick Buechner, and C. S. Lewis. But this book is about contemporary Christian music, and a number of Christian music artists have inspired me as well. A list of my personal favorites would include Andrae Crouch, Kim Hill, Daniel Amos, Amy Grant, Mark Heard, Phil Keaggy, Love Song, P.O.D., The Seventy Sevens, and Starflyer 59.

    Anything else you'd like readers / listeners to know:  I love Jesus and I love rock and roll. If you love either of those two things, this book might be for you. And if you love them both–well, then, it can’t miss.

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