15th October, 2009

JUSTIN MICHAEL

Album: King Above Us All

Artist: Northshore Christian Centre

Year: 2009
Label: Indie

In A Word: Beginning

The first up five track effort from Northshore Christian Centre is lead by creative arts pastor Tanya Riches.

Riches is best known for her time at Hillsong church where she wrote the 1995 hit Jesus What A Beautiful Name (a song my son could sing when he was two, proving it's an amazingly catchy melody!). This set of tunes includes a new recording of that very song.

It's a studio based recording which, for mine, misses the mark for what these songs might do live at the Northshore church. One of the challenges of recording church tunes is to try and capture the energy of a congregation who love them. Still, there are some strong melodies and lyrics here that are worth a listen.

Five songs, five writers and five lead vocalists makes for a listen that is probably unique to the Christian world and shows the type of team this church must be developing.

Certainly the strongest song is Riches' classic and, as a first up recording, this shows promise of a creative group that will continue to make a contribution to the praise and worship landscape in Australia.