Passion: "Road To One Day"

Title: Passion: the road to Oneday
Category: Contemporary Worship
Artist/Group: Various Artist
Rating: 4/5
Brought to you by the same folks responsible for the Passion series, the songs on this CD represent songs "from today's top collegiate worship leaders." Though not a live worship CD, parts of this disc follow a recent trend among some very good praise and worship bands - Sonic Flood being the best example to date - by blurring traditional praise and worship with edgier, more energetic sounds.

The first track of the CD, "Salvation" starts off with strong guitar riffs that immediately snap your head in attention. Ripe with powerful lyrics, it's a song that is sure to get your head banging and your heart pumping. "Shout to the North" is Charie Hall's straight forward rendition of Deliriou5? song of the same name. On the other hand, "Make a Joyful Noise/I Will Not Be Silent", is a cover that's been changed to the point of being unrecognizable and, at the same time, curiously familiar. "Did You Feel The Mountains Tremble?", yet another Delirious cover, starts with an interesting introduction of soft acoustics and the familiar voice of Matt Redman.

Initially, I had intended to give a 3/5 rating because I generally favor live CD's and frown on cover versions of songs that have not been rearranged and significantly improved. For example, I already own versions of "Shout to the North", "Did You Feel the Mountains Tremble?", and "Jesus, Lover of My Soul, and I do not want to spend any more money on them. But two songs by themselves pushed the rating to 4/5 - "Salvation" and "Make a Joyful Noise/I Will Not Be Silent". The latter is one of my personal favorites - I could sing the "I will not be silent" refrain for hours!

If you like any of the albums in the Passion series, you will want to get your hands on this one. This year's Passion 2000 Conference: "One Day" was held on May 20th in Memphis. I'm expecting a great live worship CD from this conference in October or November.

You can visit Passion's official website at passionnow.org

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