By Mary Thurmond | Photo Editor
Turn on a Christian radio station today and you’ll probably hear the same thing: soft piano chords, a voice that swells into a dramatic chorus and lyrics that could be swapped from one song to the next without much difference. It’s safe, polished and fits neatly into Sunday morning worship sets. But it doesn’t feel alive. It doesn’t hit the way Christian music used to.
Back in the 2000s and early 2010s, bands like Flyleaf, pre-2016 Skillet, Switchfoot, RED and Thousand Foot Krutch weren’t afraid to sound messy. They brought guitars, grit and raw energy to the table. They wrote songs that gave people space to scream out their faith, their doubts and their pain. Flyleaf’s “All Around Me” was desperate and haunting. Skillet’s “Awake and Alive” made you feel like you could take on the world while still clinging to hope. RED’s “Breathe Into Me” captured the tension between brokenness and redemption with a heaviness that hit hard. That music had teeth.
Somewhere along the way, Christian music lost that edge. The industry leaned hard into worship pop, the kind of music that works well for congregational singing but leaves little room for anything else. Those songs have their place; they’re accessible and uplifting. But when they become the entire identity of Christian music, something important gets lost. Faith isn’t always neat, and the music should reflect that.
People still crave songs that feel like a gut punch — songs that make sense when you’re driving at night, angry, heartbroken or uncertain. Sometimes you need music that lets you yell instead of just swaying back and forth. And when Christian music refuses to go there, many listeners turn to secular bands. Not because they’ve given up on faith, but because they’re looking for honesty.
That’s what the old Christian rock scene offered. It gave people permission to wrestle with the hard parts of life while still pointing back to God. It was messy, sometimes even uncomfortable, but it felt real. Whenever Skillet or Switchfoot tours, fans still show up. When Flyleaf reunited with Lacey Sturm, it made headlines. There’s still hunger for that sound.
So what would happen if Christian music dared to reclaim it? What if new artists decided to move past the formula and bring back songs that were loud, emotional, even a little rough around the edges? Not every song has to fit a Sunday setlist. Sometimes faith looks more like crying in the shower or screaming in your car than raising your hands in a sanctuary. Music should leave space for that, too.
Christian music isn’t dead, but it’s on life support. Too much of what’s coming out now feels polished to the point of emptiness, designed to fill playlists rather than move people. If the industry continues to play it safe, it risks losing not just its relevance, but also its ability to genuinely move hearts. Worship isn’t supposed to feel like background noise. Faith isn’t supposed to sound like wallpaper. People are aching for something real, something that shakes them awake and makes them feel alive again.
It’s time for another wave of bands willing to risk being loud, messy and brutally honest. Faith isn’t always pretty, and pretending it is does a disservice to everyone living through doubt, heartbreak and hope all at once. The best Christian music has always embraced that tension, giving people permission to scream, to cry and to believe at the same time. If we really mean what we’re singing about — life, death, redemption, eternity — then the music can’t afford to sound this flat. It has to roar.
