3rd March, 2010

JUSTIN MICHAEL

Album: Love Is On The Move

Artist:  Leeland

Year: 2009
Label: Essential/Sony

In A Word: Conscientious

Leeland. A bloke, some brothers, a band. They’re a church band really. They’re a pop band as well.  They’re both. They’re possibly the result of Michael W Smith morphing pop music into church music and Delirious? doing the opposite back in the day. 

They’re kinda the last 20 years of contemporary Christian music in a new form. It’s not youthy and it’s not for the oldies. It’s mature pop with a Christian conscience, a worship edge, a melodic hook and the players just happen to be young.

The follow up to the brilliant Opposite Way album of 2007 is Love Is On The Move. With track titles like Pure Bride, Via Dolorosa, New Creation, Holy Spirit Have Your Way and My Jesus, the listener has little chance of missing what the record is on about. It rolls together like a well written Bible study curriculum (that’s a compliment btw).

Produced by Ed Cash (Tomlin, Crowder, Curtis Chapman) sonically it will move you, but there’s no denying, the material Leeland bring to the studio is steller.  From the ‘ooh, ooh’ hook in the opening cut The Door to the Jars of Clay-esque Carry Me On Your Back and the prayerful Weak Man - ‘Jesus give me your heart / let there be a death in me” - there’s plenty of good reasons to get in on the move here.