The Best Album in Years

Knowledgable observers are shocked to learn that the new switchfoot album, Nothing is Sound, is only #2 in our countdown.  Only about a month old, how could it not still be on constant rotation?

While a very fine album, and probably the best thing being played on mainstream radio today, NiS is not up to the very-high standards that have been set by my favorite band.  Not as good as The Beautiful Letdown or Learning to Breathe, both 5-star albums.

Even if it were 5-stars, would it be enough to topple the CD at #1?  Probably not.  That CD is A Collision, by the David Crowder Band.  This album shocked me by how good it is.  I mean, DCB has been an above-average modern worship band, but would i have even noticed them if they weren't Baylor grads?  So when my good friend Shane started in on his one-man PR campaign about this one, even before it was released, i was pretty ho-hum about it. 

Then Shane sent me a review (which i posted on Amazon on his behalf), and i was finally intrigued enough to buy the thing.  I was blown away!  I'm not sure i've ever heard anything quite like it, so it's hard to categorize or describe musically.  Modern worship, to be sure, with a rocking edge in the vein of Delirious?.  But mixed in with poetry & Hank Williams & a panoply of sonic art. 

This one has my highest possible recommendation.

I've even managed to get the kids interested in it, something Shane portended but i really didn't believe was likely.  E&J now request track 18 (We Win!) all the time.

Here is commentary from the band about this album...

here is a snapshot of a small number of things that toppled into one another, resulting in our latest cd ­ a collision:

a book from the early 60's, neils bohr's model of the atom, the arabic numeral 3, the arabic numeral 4, a television show on the rural farm delivery network, cancer, a tsunami in east asia, the eschatology of bluegrass, an episode of columbo, country music legend/historian marty stuart, a jacket, a bomb, the barn behind my house, a conversation with a very intelligent acquaintance of mine who is currently finishing up phd work in super string theory, and who happened to mention, in very whimsical tone, one sunny texas afternoon, that we were, and i quote, "walking around in the sky." he said, while pointing to nothing in particular, "you see, there is the ground and there is the sky and we are somewhere in between. we're walking around in it. our feet are on the ground but..."

themes: an eschatological statement regarding death, mortality, good and evil, the second coming, the raising of the dead, oppression, deliverance, hope, bluegrass music, hiroshima, springtime, the quiet waiting that comes just before the loudest sound ever.